How Advertising Works in Chippenham #15


  1. Decide on your party's campaign slogan and style
  2. Distribute large posters to your party faithful
  3. Display in a field at the side of the road
  4. Wait for a blogger with a camera to notice something's been added
  5. Et Voila!

Chippenham's a completely new constituency for next month's general election and for the first time I find myself living in a marginal instead of a particular party's safe seat. For once my vote really counts and so I'm in even more of a dither about it than usual.

In previous elections it's been noticeable how Chippenham town has been awash with orange (denoting Liberal Democrat devotees), but outside in the countryside all the farmer's fields are sporting Conservative blue. Now the constituency of North Wiltshire has been split into two along rural/urban lines and it'll be interesting to see if the 'visual poll' I've previously observed is reflected in actual results. In Wiltshire the Labour party doesn't get a look in, so voting here doesn't really reflect what our residents might think about today's Government.

This is the first election poster you see when arriving at Chippenham from Corsham. It's been amended to read:

Lib Dems have a clue

Cameron and Brown sniff glue

Nick Clegg

Somehow I don't think this particular slogan will be taken up by the Lib Dem campaign ;)

Comments

  1. rachel12 April 2010 at 09:03

    Naughty, naughty Nick Clegg, defacing an election poster like that.....

    ReplyDelete
  2. Monica the Garden Faerie12 April 2010 at 12:45

    LOL, here change is associated with democrats/liberals, not conservatives. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. VP12 April 2010 at 13:20

    Rachel - strange how the leader's name's been used rather than the local candidate.

    Monica - I think rather a lot has been 'borrowed' from Obama's campaign. And we're having our first ever televised debates too.

    ReplyDelete
  4. easygardener12 April 2010 at 13:57

    How poetic! We are stuck in a very safe seat here - which makes the whole voting experience very unexciting.

    ReplyDelete
  5. petoskystone12 April 2010 at 15:35

    hey--american advertising has spread to the u.k. (but w/out obsenities)! ;)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Joan12 April 2010 at 15:43

    Washington State is split down the middle too...with the heavily populated 1/3 western side blue (lib dems) and the 2/3 farming side conservatives (red). The Blue always rules, so much so the red side wants to split and be it's own state.

    ReplyDelete
  7. K M Kelly12 April 2010 at 19:27

    LOL - nice one - we've got several of those massive posters in the fields round here - they seem to be going for size whilst labour are going for quantity. (Ours is a marginal too)

    ReplyDelete
  8. The bike shed12 April 2010 at 19:55

    Great spot - I shall laugh as I pass it.

    ReplyDelete
  9. VP12 April 2010 at 20:08

    EG - that's how I've felt for the past 30 years of voting, though I've always voted because women died so I could have the vote. This time it's rather exciting. Since living in Chippenham we've always voted in some pretty unusual polling stations which I'll tell you about another time.

    Petoskystone - this kind of poster's been around for quite some time over here, but yes the slogan must be kinda familiar to you guys!

    Joan - welcome! I suppose that's what's happened to us here. For voting purposes at least.

    Kate - the Lib Dems are going for quantity - lots of diamond shaped orange posters are up all around town...

    Mark - I thought of you when I saw this 'cos it's right by where you live! I've had a real pearler arrive today. I didn't plan for quite so many posts about the general election, but I can't ignore the leaflet which came this evening!

    ReplyDelete

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