What Part is the Angus?

I don't particularly care for the food at Jack-in-the-Box (though I do have a weakness for their tacos - a frequent late night snack when I was in college). Their advertising, though, is very good and features "Jack", the mythical clown-headed leader of the company. Their latest ad is particularly funny...at least to viewers, though not to the competition:

The parent company of the Carl's Jr. and Hardee's fast food chains sued rival Jack In The Box Inc. on Friday to stop TV ads that it says suggest Carl's Jr. and Hardee's use cow anus to make Angus beef hamburgers.

CKE Restaurants Inc. sued Jack In The Box in U.S. District Court on Friday over an ad in which executives laugh hysterically at the word "Angus" and another where the chain's pingpong ball-headed mascot, Jack, is asked to point to a diagram of a cow and show where Angus meat comes from.

"I'd rather not," the pointy-nosed Jack replies.

The employee asking the question traces a circle in the air with his pen while pronouncing the word Angus.

CKE claims the ads create the misleading impression that Jack In The Box's new 100 percent sirloin burgers use a better quality of meat than the Angus beef used by Carl's Jr. and Hardee's. CKE claims the spots confuse consumers by comparing sirloin, a cut of meat found on all cattle, with Angus, which is a breed of cattle.

I thought the ad was hilarious, and in fact was in a McDonald's yesterday where they had large poster ads for their Angus burgers, but the only thing I could think of was Jack's comment "I'd rather not".

The article points out that Carl's Jr. is not exactly innocent when it comes to controversial advertising:

CKE is known for running controversial ads for its chains, including one featuring a scantily clad Paris Hilton washing a car while eating a burger. But CKE claims the Jack In the Box ads go too far.

"They're not being funny," CKE chief executive Andrew F. Puzder said Friday. "They need to stop misleading people about what Angus beef is."

Puzder said that the company asked Jack In the Box to drop the ads, but that the chain refused and pointed to a Carl's Jr. TV spot suggesting Carl's Jr. milk shakes were superior to those served by competitors.

Puzder said the comparison was not valid because the Carl's Jr. ads did not suggest that Jack In the Box shakes were made from milk that came from an unsavory part of the cow.

Oh lighten up, Carl's, you bunch of big babies. It's a clever ad. If you want to dispute it, run your own ad making fun of Jack-in-the-Box. Consumers like clever advertising. They don't like executives that act like...well, an angus.

In case you haven't seen the ad, here you go: