From the EE Lists come some "language problems" . . . .
1. The Dairy Association's huge success with the campaign "Got Milk?"
prompted them to expand advertising to Mexico. It was soon brought
to their attention the Spanish translation read "Are you lactating?"
2. Coors put its slogan, "Turn it loose," into Spanish, where it was read
as "Suffer from diarrhea".
3. Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an
American campaign: "Nothing sucks like an Electrolux".
4. Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick", a curling iron, into Germany only
to find out that "mist" is slang for manure. Not too many people
had use for the "manure stick".
5. When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same
packaging as in the US, with the smiling baby on the label. Later
they learned that in Africa, companies routinely put pictures
on the labels of what's inside, since many people can't read.
6. Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a
notorious porno magazine.
7. An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish
market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the
Pope" (el Papa), the shirts read "I saw the potato" (la papa).
8. Pepsi's "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi
brings your ancestors back from the grave", in Chinese.
9. The Coca-Cola name in China was first read as "Kekoukela", meaning
"Bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax", depending
on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 characters to find a
phonetic equivalent "kokou kole", translating into "happiness
in the mouth".
10. Frank Perdue's chicken slogan, "it takes a strong man to make a
tender chicken" was translated into Spanish as "it takes an
aroused man to make a chicken affectionate".
11. When Parker Pen marketed a ball-point pen in Mexico, its ads were
supposed to have read, "it won't leak in your pocket and embarrass
you". The company thought that the word embarazar" (to impregnate)
meant to embarrass, so the ad read: "It won't leak in your pocket
and make you pregnant"
12. When American Airlines wanted to advertise its new leather first
class seats in the Mexican market, it translated its "Fly in
leather" campaign literally, which meant "Fly naked" (vuela en
cuero) in Spanish.
(
geocities.com/hanson_c)