Nicorette Suckometer knows how much it sucks to quit smoking

The New York Times recently noted that the term "douche" has gained wide currency, but what about the word "sucks"? I'm not sure you could have run a commercial in, say, 1990 that used the word, but in 2009, it's apparently OK. This Nicorette ad from TBWA\Chiat\Day not only adds "sucks" to the script, but makes a device called a Suckometer a central character. (Could this be an offshoot of the Clash's famous Bullshit Detector?) The Suckometer is activated when a haggard young man is caught in traffic and looks enviously upon another driver's cigarette. "Man, quitting sucks," he thinks to himself. Nicorette, meanwhile, gets somewhat faint praise. It's not a miracle drug, but it "makes quitting suck less." Maybe other marketers could follow this approach. Starbucks can tout its ability to make waking up suck less. And it's only a matter of time before Scope boasts that it "makes your breath smell less like shit."

—Posted by Todd Wasserman