BUZZ NEWS

Mad Men Take Over New York Subway

Posted on July 18, 2008
Jessica Hartstein

What is your quintessential NY image? Some would say the Statue of Liberty, others the Chrysler Building, others Times Square, and the list could go on.

I personally have always been impressed by Grand Central Station (the train station, not the subway station). It is exactly what a train station is supposed to look like: a huge, marble lobby, a gazillion ticket counters, an information pagoda in the middle, and long platforms with big numbers. I love that station! But can it be replicated?

Well, that is just what AMC has tried to do with its new street marketing campaign. In order to advertise the premiere (July 27th, 10pm/9C) of the 2nd season of its Golden Globe winning series Mad Men, the channel has converted the Times Square-Grand Central shuttle into a Grand Central replica. Ok, so no real ticket counters or marble inside the subway cars, but…here, check out this picture.

What exactly are we to think of this? The very shuttle that takes us to and from Grand Central is decorated to look like Grand Central? Maybe I would be a bit more excited if it looked like something a bit further away and exotic…say, Machu Picchu!

However, my desire to travel to faraway lands was not what AMC Senior Vice President of Marketing, Linda Schupack, had in mind. According to her, the aim is to "give people a sense of Don Draper and his world and to present Mad Men as distinctive, cinematic, beautiful and complex." She said that they chose Grand Central "both for its iconic stature and as a transition between worlds: work and home, the familiar and the new."

As you can see from the pictures, it certainly is eye-catching. Did you notice how Draper looks over subway-goers? And, maybe somehow having marble-looking benches will help us forget how gross NY subway seats usually are. Also, I absolutely dread having to catch that Times Square-Grand Central shuttle during summer rush hour—does it really have to be that harrowing of an experience? For that reason, I suppose a little distraction can’t be that bad! Especially when “Mr. I’m one of God’s Earth Angels” gets into your car and you want to pretend you’re anywhere but there.

I, for one, am happy that New Yorkers have so far been sophisticated enough not to allow marketing to do this (see pic below) to their subway cars. I actually took this bonafide (i.e. not aimed at tourists) train in Japan.

When you think of how many people travel that Times Square-Grand Central shuttle to move between East and West Manhattan, you have to give them credit for their marketing idea…and it has to make us wonder if we’ll be seeing more similar street marketing campaigns in the future.

Let’s see if this initiative gets people watching AMC on Sunday, July 27th at 10PM/PC.