The most useful target for a self-deprecating brand ad is often the brand’s own sense of importance: treating a small improvement as a historic event, assuming an old slogan fits every situation, or giving every product an epic soundtrack. Admitting that excess can make room for a lighter tone. But when the joke concerns trouble customers have already experienced, “we know we look ridiculous” is not enough.
The creative decision is what the brand is laughing at, and who will still be dealing with the consequences afterward. Self-awareness can be a tone of voice. It is not automatically a remedy.
Two KFC admissions, with different subjects
The One Club’s 2019 FCK entry describes delivery problems that closed UK KFC restaurants in February 2018. The print work, credited to Mother London and other partners, used an empty bucket and the brand’s letters rearranged as “FCK” to apologize. It first appeared in two British newspapers on February 23, 2018. These details come from a historical entrant account; this article does not adopt its reported reach or effectiveness figures.
The empty bucket points to something missing. Rather than making the logo arbitrarily funny, the brand’s own symbol acknowledges an absence. That is our interpretation of the creative device, not proof that the ad restored trust or resolved the supply problem.
A different admission appeared on August 24, 2020. KFC’s official announcement used a self-mocking award for an ill-fitting slogan to announce a temporary pause in “It’s Finger Lickin’ Good” in advertising, while saying the food itself was unchanged. The target was a slogan’s mismatch with its circumstances, not the customer’s predicament.
Together, these accounts offer something more specific than “big brands can laugh at themselves.” Each names a different matter: an admission about a shortage, and a change to advertising language. A similar tone does not make those communications interchangeable. This is an analysis of historical written material, not hygiene advice or a claim that the 2020 arrangement remains in force today.
Mocking the brand’s posture is not mocking a useless product
Everyday advertising does not need a real incident to find humor. A brand that keeps awarding itself prizes, gives an ordinary feature a monumental name, or films every minor update as a turning point already has a possible subject: its communication habits.
By contrast, an ad that repeatedly shows a supposedly dependable product failing cannot assume that “just kidding” at the end will remove the concern. Failure may be what viewers remember. This does not mean a product’s limitations are off-limits. It means the ad should know what understanding it offers: a trade-off worth explaining, or a real problem that needs attention? Either is more precise than simply wanting to appear relatable.
Put viewers beside the brand, not on cleanup duty
The brand can admit its exaggeration without making everyone else exaggerated. A customer’s calm “I just need to hold these pages together” may work better than a roomful of people cheering on command. It gives viewers a position from which to notice the distance between brand grandeur and an ordinary need.
If a character has to appear ignorant, unreasonable or incapable of appreciating the product for the brand to seem charming, the target has shifted. A brand delivering the joke does not necessarily bear its cost. Restoring a legitimate need to each character often makes that distinction easier to see.
Giving a binder clip an excessively grand entrance
Consider a fictional writing exercise. An ordinary binder clip sits on a podium under solemn lighting. Music swells as the voiceover prepares to announce a major advance in the future of the desk. The shot widens: the clip is simply holding a few sheets of paper. Someone working at the desk takes them and carries on. This is not an existing campaign or an ONCE client project.
The joke is that the advertising has built itself too large a stage. The clip still performs an ordinary task, and the person is not mocked for being insufficiently excited. The product does not have to become worthless. It can be useful without being monumental.
The filmmaking can reveal that difference gradually. Early framing treats the object with ceremony; the wider view establishes its actual scale and everyday setting. Music withdraws before the grand declaration is finished, leaving the sound of paper and work continuing. This is a proposal to rehearse, not a prescribed duration or a tested comedy formula. Showing the whole setup immediately might turn the contrast into set dressing. A voiceover repeatedly explaining the self-mockery could spell out what viewers might otherwise discover.
Another version could avoid a reveal altogether: sustain the solemn performance and finish with a very plain product description. One approach depends on a turn in the viewing experience; the other keeps inflated language and ordinary facts side by side. The choice depends on whether this is a recognizable posture for the brand, and whether viewers recognize the expression being teased.
Necessary information need not wait behind the punchline
When a communication really concerns delays, shortages or service failures, practical information should be directly available: what is affected, what response is confirmed, and where the next update will appear. Customers should not have to understand a joke to find information that concerns them. Nor should a neat ending promise a remedy that has not been arranged.
Short edits require the same judgment. Keep only the clip’s epic entrance and remove its everyday use, and the self-deprecation may become exaggeration again. A version in another language does not have to translate the same grand declaration literally. It can preserve the relationship—a brand taking itself too seriously beside a person with an ordinary need—and find locally natural language. A historical campaign’s letterplay or tone is not a universal localization template.
Brands do not have to keep diminishing themselves to seem approachable. Sometimes a straightforward account of a product’s strengths is more honest than another declaration that the brand is nothing special. Useful self-deprecation lowers the brand’s posture enough to reveal its real relationship with people. It does not shrink their reasonable expectations along with it.
If you are developing a humorous brand film, bring your habitual brand language, the product understanding you want to preserve, and an initial scene to a conversation with ONCE about brand video creative. Identify what is worth laughing at before deciding how to film it.
Source note: The One Club archive and KFC’s August 24, 2020 release were consulted on October 19, 2026. The binder-clip scene and original AI cover are fictional concepts. This article is not based on audience tests, interviews or viewing complete campaign films, and promises no humor, trust or business outcome.
