A Semiotic Analysis of

‘Make Mine Milk’

Advertising Campaign

By Davinia Obedih, 0801026

Advertising Coursework, August 2010
Bsc Business Enterprise
University of Buckingham

Word Count: 2,106

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Table of .
Contents
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INTRODUCTION 2

The ‘Make Mine Milk’ Advert 2

Take a Break Magazine 4

What is Semiotics? 5

THE ANALYSIS 6

Brand Context 6

Overall Category Context 7

Popular Cultural Context 8

Audience Interpretation 9

CONCLUSION 9

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‘Make Mine Milk' Campaign

Understanding the Value of Semiotics in

Advertising

Introduction
The purpose of this essay is to help the reader understand the value of semiotics in
advertising. I will do this by conducting a semiotic analysis of the A Team ‘Make Mine
Milk’ advert from Take a Break magazine. I shall identify signs and codes from the
advert and then examine them in three semiotic contexts, the brand context, overall
category context and popular culture context. Then show how this information allows
me to accurately anticipate the target audience’s interpretation of the advert, before
concluding with a summary of the potential value of semiotics to the advertiser.

The ‘Make Mine Milk’ Advert

The £7.5m ‘Make Mine Milk’ campaign launched in
April, 2010 across the UK in a bid to promote the
consumption of milk. It is designed to re-ignite the
British milk industry, to increase declining sales
figures and to position low-fat milk as the “drink of
choice” for young people and their families.

The adverts are run by the Milk Marketing Forum of

trade association Dairy UK, and is one-third financed
by the European Commission.

The A Team are the newest popular icon to be in the

adverts, there are also adverts with chef Gordon
Ramsay, pop star Pixie Lott and R n B singer Usher
Raymond, to promote the benefits of low-fat milk to
teenagers and mums across the country.

The celebrities all sport milk moustaches on the adverts above the slogan ‘Make Mine
Milk’, that have appeared on poster sites, buses, online and print mediums around
the country.

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The campaign follows on from a ‘White Stuff’ campaign in Scotland, which featured
the voices of Chris Eubank, Rolf Harris, Prince Naseem Hamed and the late George
Best and resulted in a 3.4% increase in milk sales. The United States also has a
similar and very popular celebrity fronted ‘Got Milk?’ campaign, which is still running.

The initiative aims to turn around declining sales of milk. Figures show there has
been a 1% decline in milk consumption each year between 2001 and 2008, down
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from 1,689 ml per person per week, to 1,555 ml .

“Since the mid-nineties milk sales have plateaued in Great Britain, during
which time the perception of milk amongst the public has become
outdated. This campaign will spark a shake-up of attitudes to milk,
putting it firmly back on the map and in the fridge of consumers across
Great Britain.” - Sandy Wilkie, Chairman, Milk Marketing Forum
(www.dairyuk.org)

To support the adverts, a website, www.makeminemilk.co.uk has been created

where anyone interested in the campaign can find out more. ‘Make Mine Milk’ is also
being launched on Facebook to tap into large quantities of young people. These are
shown on the A Team advert in the white text box.

1
Joe Thomas: ‘Pixie Lott and Gordon Ramsay front new milk campaign’. April 2010.
Geoff Platt: ‘Usher and The A-Team to front Make Mine Milk’ . July 2010.

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Take a Break Magazine

Editorial Positioning of Take A Break magazine

Take a Break (described as ‘the world’s No. 1 true-life weekly magazine’)

has been the biggest selling women's weekly in the UK for nearly 20
years. One in ten women in the UK read Take a Break every week and it
sells 2 copies every second, making it the 4th largest women's weekly in
the world. - www.bauer.co.uk

Take a Break's mix of real life, fashion,

beauty, food, home, travel and competitions
attracts a hugely varied readership. Readers
can be anything from 18 to 80; they are
likely to own their own home and to be
married, and many have children. Its
universal appeal is confirmed by the
strength of its reader relationship. The table
below shows the magazine’s intended target
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audience, sourced from publisher’s website .

Circulation 855,372

Adult Readership 2,795,000

Female Readership 2,322,000

Target Market C1C2 women age 25-55 with children

Frequency Weekly

Launch date March 1990

Price 80p

The full page advert appeared on p. 24, near the middle of magazine and opposite a
‘Readers Reality’ section about a young mom and her baby (the right audience for
the advertising message). Other adverts in the magazine tended to be for family,
home, health, public services, confectionary, etc, and they are often in advertorial
style to blend in with the reality focus of readership. I believe it was well placed in
this medium to capture the attention of a broad cross-section of their target market -
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teenagers and families - because the A Team advert stands out from the rest of the
magazine. As the four actors are handsome men of varying ages they are going to
appeal to the predominantly female readership of the magazine.

2
Bauer (Take a Break publisher) website - http://www.bauer.co.uk
3
See The Analysis section below.

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What is Semiotics?
The name ‘semiotics’ comes from the Greek, ‘semei-‘ meaning ‘sign’ or ‘signal’.
Semiotics therefore is the study of a system of signs. Signs can be words, images,
sounds, odours, colours, words, flavours, acts or objects, but such things have no
intrinsic meaning and become signs only when we invest them with meaning.

When used in market research, semiotics looks at how signs operate in a brands’
products, packaging, advertising, promotions, website, etc and also how signs
operate in popular culture. Everything connected with a brand is a sign, from their
logo to the colour, shape and feel of the product’s packaging, to communication
language, website layout and staff uniform. In order to fully understand the meaning
of brand signs one must study them in context, and in advertising semiotics focuses
on three main contexts:

• The brand

• The overall category i.e. competitors

• Popular culture

The two dominant models of semiotics are those of the linguist Ferdinand de
Saussure and the philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce. I will focus solely on
Saussure’s model in this essay.

Saussure offered a 'dyadic' or two-part model of the sign. He defined a sign e.g. the
word 'open' (when seen by someone on a shop doorway) as being composed of:

• a 'signifier' - the form which the sign takes e.g. the word open; and
• the 'signified' - the concept it represents e.g. that the shop is open for
business.

The sign is the whole that results from the association of the signifier with the
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signified.

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Chandler, Daniel: Semiotics for Beginners, article on Aberystwyth University website -
http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/sem02.html

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Semiotics is beneficial to the advertiser in understanding advertising communication

because it reveals unspoken cultural rules, known as codes, that underpin
contemporary communications and determine how people make sense of what
others are talking about. This knowledge allows the advertiser to ensure:

• Strategic coherence between all brand elements

• Competitive distinctiveness at a time when attention is in short supply
• Cultural relevance in all strategic communication with their target audience

The Analysis
• The brand context

• The overall category context i.e. competitors

• Popular culture context

Brand Context
The brand being promoted in the A Team advert by advertisers the Milk Marketing
Forum of trade body Dairy UK, is ‘Make Mine Milk’. There are many signs in this
advert that are intended to communicate specific messages to their target audience
about the product and brand.

The A Team is a sign in the advert made up of:

• a signifier: the image of the A Team wearing milk moustaches;

• a signified concept: that the product and brand are utilized by the A Team

When celebrities are used as signs in adverts, the signified association between the
celebrity, the product and the brand transfers certain audience perceptions from the
former to the latter. These include feeling that the milk product has similar
characteristics of being of superior quality, stylish, exclusive and is very desirable.

The A Team are also the main actors in a July 2010 Hollywood remake of the iconic
‘Alpha Team’ which has been watched and loved since 1983. Celebrities are
commonly used in luxury advertising because they are out of people’s reach,
aspirational. The image of the A Team is a signifier that signifies strength, cool,
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timelessness, and goodness . By using the A Team in the advert, these traits become
associated in the audiences’ mind with the brand and the achieves the advertisers
goal of making milk a cool choice for the audience they aim to attract.

The table below identifies other important signifiers and what each intends to signify
(signified) about the ‘Make Mine Milk’’ brand.

Signifiers Signified

The A Team image Strength, cool, timelessness

5
See Popular cultural context below.

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Milk moustaches Identity, unified cause

‘Make Mine Milk’ logo Desirable choice

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‘Drink up fool’ text
‘Low fat milk, less than 2% fat’ logo Healthy

EU logo International authority

‘Join the ‘M’ team’ text Open, welcoming community

‘Visit facebook fan page’ text Open, welcoming community

Overall Category Context

By examining the signs in other public organisations advertise their healthier food
messages one uncovers some obvious ‘unwritten rules’ or conventions that are
followed in this particular market sector.

Some communication codes in the government adverts below include, showing the
food item (whether in a positive or negative light); repeated use of specific icons
(such as heart shape in Ad1 and Ad2 below) for recognition; using the persuasion
and informational model of consumer influence; usually images of ordinary people if
any at all; authoritative logos; and comparison with poorer alternatives amongst
others.

Other Food Adverts

1. 2.

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A play on Mr T’s classic phrase, “I pity the fool!” See Popular Cultural Context section below.

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3. 4.

5.

The ‘Make Mine Milk’ advert definitely challenges some very established rules that
are conventionally used in public organisations food advertising, such as using
celebrities instead of ordinary people; Using a popular film in advert;
Social/community building via facebook / Join ‘M’ Team. While staying true to other
advertising conventions including using the Persuasive model of consumer influence;
Using logos and identifiers (low fat logo, milk moustache); Using authoritative logos
so in fact looks at first glance like a government ad because of EU logo but is a
commercial advert for trade association Dairy UK.

Popular Cultural Context

The A-Team is an American action adventure television series about a fictional group
of ex-United States Army Special Forces personnel who work as soldiers of fortune.
Despite being thought of as mercenaries by the other characters in the show, the A-
Team always acted on the side of good and helped the oppressed. The popular show
ran for 4 years in the 1980s and it remains known in popular culture today with the
July 2010 Hollywood remake being used in the advert. The show also served as the
springboard for the career of Mr. T, who portrayed the character of B. A. Baracus,

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around whom the show was initially conceived. Some of the show's catchphrases,
such as "I pity the fool!" by Mr T, have also made their way onto T-shirts and other
merchandise.

By studying the popular culture within which the A Team exist one can interprete
conscious and subconscious messages the target audience are likely to pick up about
the advert. These include transference of the coolness and ongoing popularity of the
A Team to the product, the idea their strength and long lasting life has come from
choosing milk all these years and the message that milk is good for people of all
generations. Also the A Team, especially Mr T, give forceful advise for people to do
the right thing ‘or else’. This is communicated in the advert text ‘Drink up Fool!’ and
audiences will pick up on that as well.

Audience Interpretation
As well as successfully interpreting the popular context of the advert it successfully
puts across the advertisers message that low fat milk can be drank regularly and is a
cool, socially acceptable choice of drink for a younger and older generation to make.

Conclusion
I have shown semiotics in action and one can easily understand its value to the
advertiser. Part of this value is retrospective, as in this essay, where semiotic analysis
is used to gain valuable insight into what made a piece of communication successful
so it can be repeated. By uncovering unwritten rules used in advertising by
competitors in a market, semiotics allows the advertiser to strategically develop its
communication strategies to achieve maximum differentiation from competitors, as
seen with the A Team advert. And finally, semiotics enables the advertiser to align
packaging and advertising with a specific brand proposition or marketing objectives,
for example re-branding the image of milk to increase industry wide sales. It is clear
that semiotics is a powerful tool to advertisers, which is currently underutilized. By
recognising and employing it, the advertiser sets himself apart from the competition.

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References
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Rachel Lawes: ‘Demystifying Semiotics: Some Key Questions Answered’ . 2002 Article,
International Journal of Market Research, Vol.44, (3), pp.251-266.

ONLINE

Bauer (Take a Break publisher) website - http://www.bauer.co.uk

Chandler, Daniel: Semiotics for Beginners. Article on Aberystwyth University website

- http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/S4B/sem02.html

Dairy UK website: www.dairyuk.org

Geoff Platt: Usher and The A-Team to front Make Mine Milk. 5 July 2010, Article on
FoodBev.com - http://www.foodbev.com/news/usher-and-the-a-team-to-front-make-
mine-milk

Joe Thomas: ‘Pixie Lott and Gordon Ramsay front new milk campaign’. 12 April 2010,
Article on Campaign website - http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/news/995974/Pixie-
Lott-Gordon-Ramsay-front-new-milk-campaign/

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