Y’all, it’s all in fun. <3 to all the creative (adjective) teams that worked hard on this creative (noun), except maybe the Hotel Chocolat one.
One might think that I, a perennial breaker of grammar rules and messer-with of language, would cheer brands doing exactly that in their taglines. Why shouldn’t they play with language? Why shouldn’t Nutella “Spread the happy”? At the very least, it’s accurate — I know I’ve always felt happy when I’ve spread Nutella.
And then I was watching TV and was barraged by the same InterContinental Hotel ad instructing me to “Guest how you guest,” and I discovered even I have limits.
They are, at least, pretty indulgent limits. I offer a lot of wiggle room in acceptable levels of grammar manipuliification.
The innocuous: Nouning adjectives
Not all grammar manipulation is infuriating. Sometimes, you’re just looking for a way to express your brand promise — like spreading happy — in an unusual way.
United Airlines: “Good leads the way.”
Leesa: “Committed to better”
PNC Bank: “Boring has its rewards.”
Maybe it’s a little abstract, maybe it’s just omitting a form of the verb “be,” maybe it’s a pair of quotation marks away from more or less making sense, but it’s easy to pick up what you’re putting down.
The annoying: Advanced adjective nouning
And then sometimes, you’re abusing the format. Because y’all, that’s just a word. All you did was pick a word and put it there, and I don’t even know what “rich” is but I’m pretty sure I don’t have any to find.
Edward Jones: “Let’s find your rich.”
Deloitte:“Together makes progress.”
And Jaguar’s controversial 2024 rebrand invited us (in all lowercase) not only to “create exuberant” but also to“live vivid” and also to “delete ordinary,”
You just picked a word, y’all, and that’s not writing, it’s just wording.
The obnoxious: Verbing nouns
I realize that in the age of “adulting” and “friending” and whatnot, the verbing of nouns is so commonplace, it’s practically not worth mentioning. But it has to mean something. (You just picked a word, y’all.) Because I can figure out from context clues what I’m supposed to be doing when I guest, but I’ll be damned if I can sort out the process of extra-ing.
IHG Hotels: “Guest how you guest” and “Extra how you extra.”
Google: “Google, the new way to cloud”
Geico: “It’s easy to Geico,” and “It feels good to Geico.”
That last one gets extra obnoxious points for verbing not just a noun but its own brand — twice. Get over yourself, Geico.
Kill me now: Y’all, I don’t even know
Pile noun verbification upon adjective nouning, and what do you get? Unforgivable word salad.
Bud Light: “No matter how hard you football, it’s easy to Sunday.”
Oh, but you think that’s bad?
Hotel Chocolat:“Gift the wow.”
How. Very. Dare you.
Grammar different.
Am I painfully aware that I work in an industry that uses “creative” as a noun? Yes, I am aware. It has not escaped my awareness.
And am I also aware that one of the most iconic ads in the industry is also famous for its grammar manipulation, with Apple’s “Think Different” ad? Also yes. In its defense, the tagline functions both as an adjective nounification and as a grammar tweak of the otherwise grammatical “think differently,” which function in parallel to make a pun, and puns are acceptable, because I said so.
So, is this whole thing completely subjective on my part? Arguably, yes. I don’t universally disapprove of playing around with language — I celebrate it, in fact. Just don’t take advantage of it, is all. It loses impact (dare I say “becomes less impactful”?) when you just throw it around until you find yourself gifting wow. But it’s a good tool to have in your creative toolbox. Verbing weirds language, and that’s not necessarily a bad thing.