Media Markt
Encyclopedia
Media Markt is a German
chain of stores selling consumer electronics
with numerous branches throughout Europe
. It is Europe's largest retailer of consumer electronics.
.
Today, it is owned by MediaSaturn Holding, which also owns the Saturn
chain, which runs very similar stores. MediaSaturnHolding in turn is owned by the German retail company METRO AG
.
for its humorous, but sometimes crude, advertising
campaigns; for example, the slogan "Lasst euch nicht verarschen" ("Don't let yourself be conned").
, Media Markt launched a campaign, claiming to be the "best fan supplier" ("Bester Fanausrüster"), with commercials showing international football fans shopping at Media Markt, showing exaggerated stereotypes of the participating countries, and making fun of the Austria
n team, which did not qualify. This included a French seductress, Dutch fans smoking marijuana in caravans, or a Saudi haggling - to pay more. Germans fans were portrayed with big bellies, asking for refrigerators to keep their beer cool, rather than looking for a new TV set.
An additional series of ads, promoting a rebate of €10 for each goal Germany scores (except penalty shoot-outs), showed international soccer fans begging the Germans to score as many goals as possible - against their own team.
When the Netherlands lost to Portugal, Media Markt used a quote from a 1970s show featuring the late Rudi Carrell
, a Dutchman who was a long-time TV celebrity in Germany, to express Schadenfreude
. A World Cup trophy
is shown to grieving Dutch fans in their caravan with the comment "This would have been your prize!".
This commercial caused a scandal in Poland, for the widely known German stereotype of Poles being thieves. Media Markt argued that the advertisements also made fun of other national clichés, including Germans, and none of the other clichés were perceived as negative towards the people they presented. Its aim was to exaggerate the cliché of the Polish thief to dismiss it as unjustified prejudice, Media Markt claimed.
The store apologised and withdrew the advert after their Polish branch asked to do so, following protests in Poland, a call from the Polish embassy in Berlin and protests from German Polonia
.
, Turkey
motivated suspension of an advertisement campaign by the group on grounds that Media Markt “insulted Turkishness
” by depicting consumers that purchased overpriced merchandise with animal heads. A ban of the advertisements lasted for 3 months in 2009.
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
chain of stores selling consumer electronics
Consumer electronics
Consumer electronics are electronic equipment intended for everyday use, most often in entertainment, communications and office productivity. Radio broadcasting in the early 20th century brought the first major consumer product, the broadcast receiver...
with numerous branches throughout Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
. It is Europe's largest retailer of consumer electronics.
History
Media Markt was founded by entrepreneurs Leopold Stiefel, Walter Gunz, Erich Kellerhals, and Helga Kellerhals. The first store opened on 29 November 1979 in MunichMunich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
.
Today, it is owned by MediaSaturn Holding, which also owns the Saturn
Saturn (store)
Saturn is a German chain of electronics stores, now found in several European countries. Saturn sells household appliances, home entertainment, and media such as CDs and DVDs. With Media Markt it constitutes MediaSaturn Holding, owned by the German retail trade company METRO...
chain, which runs very similar stores. MediaSaturnHolding in turn is owned by the German retail company METRO AG
Metro AG
Metro AG is a diversified retail and wholesale/cash and carry group based in Düsseldorf, Germany. It has the largest market share in its home market, and is one of the most globalised retail and wholesale corporations. It is the fourth-largest retailer in the world measured by revenues . In English...
.
Advertising
Media Markt is known in GermanyGermany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
for its humorous, but sometimes crude, advertising
Advertising
Advertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...
campaigns; for example, the slogan "Lasst euch nicht verarschen" ("Don't let yourself be conned").
Slogan
Media Markt's main slogan "Ich bin doch nicht blöd" (I am not stupid) has been translated into the languages of the other countries where the company operates (except China):| Language | Slogan |
|---|---|
| German German language German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union.... |
Ich bin doch nicht blöd. (I am not stupid) |
| Basque Basque language Basque is the ancestral language of the Basque people, who inhabit the Basque Country, a region spanning an area in northeastern Spain and southwestern France. It is spoken by 25.7% of Basques in all territories... |
Ni ez naiz inozoa! (I am not stupid) |
| Catalan Catalan language Catalan is a Romance language, the national and only official language of Andorra and a co-official language in the Spanish autonomous communities of Catalonia, the Balearic Islands and Valencian Community, where it is known as Valencian , as well as in the city of Alghero, on the Italian island... |
Jo no sóc tonto! (I am not a fool!) |
| Dutch Dutch language Dutch is a West Germanic language and the native language of the majority of the population of the Netherlands, Belgium, and Suriname, the three member states of the Dutch Language Union. Most speakers live in the European Union, where it is a first language for about 23 million and a second... |
Ik ben toch niet gek! (I am not crazy) |
| French French language French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts... |
Je ne suis pas fou. (I am not crazy) |
| Galician Galician language Galician is a language of the Western Ibero-Romance branch, spoken in Galicia, an autonomous community located in northwestern Spain, where it is co-official with Castilian Spanish, as well as in border zones of the neighbouring territories of Asturias and Castile and León.Modern Galician and... |
Eu non son parvo! (I am not a fool!) |
| Greek Greek language Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;... |
Δεν είμαι και χτεσινός! (I was not born yesterday) |
| Hungarian Hungarian language Hungarian is a Uralic language, part of the Ugric group. With some 14 million speakers, it is one of the most widely spoken non-Indo-European languages in Europe.... |
Mert hülye azért nem vagyok! (Because I'm not stupid) |
| Italian Italian language Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia... |
Questa è la risposta! (This is the answer!) |
| Polish Polish language Polish is a language of the Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages, used throughout Poland and by Polish minorities in other countries... |
Nie dla idiotów! (Not for idiots!) |
| Portuguese Portuguese language Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095... |
Eu é que não sou parvo! (It's not me who's a fool!) |
| Spanish Spanish language Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the... |
¡Yo no soy tonto! (I am not a fool!) |
| Swedish Swedish language Swedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish... |
Allt annat känns puckat! (Everything else seems stupid!) |
| Turkish Turkish language Turkish is a language spoken as a native language by over 83 million people worldwide, making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Its speakers are located predominantly in Turkey and Northern Cyprus with smaller groups in Iraq, Greece, Bulgaria, the Republic of Macedonia, Kosovo,... |
Ben aptal değilim! (I'm not stupid!) |
| Russian Russian language Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics... |
Фантастиш маркт - Media Markt(Fantastisch Markt — Media Markt) |
2006 World Cup advertising campaign
Prior to the 2006 World Cup2006 FIFA World Cup
The 2006 FIFA World Cup was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which won the right to host the event in July 2000. Teams representing 198 national football associations from all six...
, Media Markt launched a campaign, claiming to be the "best fan supplier" ("Bester Fanausrüster"), with commercials showing international football fans shopping at Media Markt, showing exaggerated stereotypes of the participating countries, and making fun of the Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n team, which did not qualify. This included a French seductress, Dutch fans smoking marijuana in caravans, or a Saudi haggling - to pay more. Germans fans were portrayed with big bellies, asking for refrigerators to keep their beer cool, rather than looking for a new TV set.
An additional series of ads, promoting a rebate of €10 for each goal Germany scores (except penalty shoot-outs), showed international soccer fans begging the Germans to score as many goals as possible - against their own team.
When the Netherlands lost to Portugal, Media Markt used a quote from a 1970s show featuring the late Rudi Carrell
Rudi Carrell
Rudi Carrell , born Rudolf Wijbrand Kesselaar, was a Dutch entertainer. Along with famous entertainers such as Johannes Heesters, Linda de Mol and Sylvie van der Vaart, Carrell was one of the most successful Dutch personalities active in Germany.He worked as a television entertainer and hosted his...
, a Dutchman who was a long-time TV celebrity in Germany, to express Schadenfreude
Schadenfreude
Schadenfreude is pleasure derived from the misfortunes of others. This German word is used as a loanword in English and some other languages, and has been calqued in Danish and Norwegian as skadefryd and Swedish as skadeglädje....
. A World Cup trophy
FIFA World Cup Trophy
The World Cup is a gold trophy that is awarded to the winners of the FIFA World Cup. Since the advent of the World Cup in 1930, two trophies have represented victory: the Jules Rimet Trophy from 1930 to 1970, and the FIFA World Cup Trophy from 1974 to the present day.The trophy, originally named...
is shown to grieving Dutch fans in their caravan with the comment "This would have been your prize!".
Polish advertising
In March 2006, the "Poland version" showed moustache-wearing Polish customers praising the shop for "prices deep like Polish soul" before hugging the German sales managers, who looked quite uncomfortable in the bear hugs. Afterwards, one of the Germans pointed out that his watch was still there, and that "The Pole is an honest person, after all". Then, the three men are shown to be missing their trousers.This commercial caused a scandal in Poland, for the widely known German stereotype of Poles being thieves. Media Markt argued that the advertisements also made fun of other national clichés, including Germans, and none of the other clichés were perceived as negative towards the people they presented. Its aim was to exaggerate the cliché of the Polish thief to dismiss it as unjustified prejudice, Media Markt claimed.
The store apologised and withdrew the advert after their Polish branch asked to do so, following protests in Poland, a call from the Polish embassy in Berlin and protests from German Polonia
Polonia
The Polish diaspora refers to people of Polish origin who live outside Poland. The Polish diaspora is also known in modern Polish language as Polonia, which is the name for Poland in Latin and in many other Romance languages....
.
Portuguese advertising
In January 2008 Media Markt launched a campaign presenting a fictitious country called "Dumb Land", where several characters with eastern european accents were presented as being from this country, which even has an anthem. A central theme of this campaign presented a Boy Scout as an idiot. This really upset people as many consider Scouts to be responsible and valued members of society. An online petition was created to persuade Media Markt to withdraw the campaign and to offer a public apology. Due to this petition and a lot of pressure from the Scouting movement, Media Markt had to remove the Boy Scout from their campaign, including TV and radio ads.Turkish advertising
Turkish Union Association in EskişehirEskisehir
Eskişehir is a city in northwestern Turkey and the capital of the Eskişehir Province. According to the 2009 census, the population of the city is 631,905. The city is located on the banks of the Porsuk River, 792 m above sea level, where it overlooks the fertile Phrygian Valley. In the nearby...
, Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
motivated suspension of an advertisement campaign by the group on grounds that Media Markt “insulted Turkishness
Article 301 (Turkish penal code)
Article 301 is a controversial article of the Turkish Penal Code making it illegal to insult Turkey, the Turkish ethnicity, or Turkish government institutions...
” by depicting consumers that purchased overpriced merchandise with animal heads. A ban of the advertisements lasted for 3 months in 2009.