2012 ERA Moxie Awards Honors “Best” Infomercials

Once again, the Electronic Retailing Association (ERA) held its annual ceremony to hand out the Moxie Awards honoring the “best” infomercials of the year. You can see a list of all this year’s nominees and award winners at this page.

In a break with tradition (2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006) I will not go over the nominees and winners. I will, however, make the observation that Proactiv Solution won four more awards this year, bringing its lifetime total of Moxie Awards to 97 quazillion. It’s true that Proactiv was not able to win its gazillionth award in the coveted “Best Long Form Infomercial” and “Best Short Form Infomercial” categories this year, but the folks at Guthy-Renker should be proud to have Proactiv nominated in both these categories for the fifty-seventh bajillionth time in a row.

So that you don’t have to watch the whole boring thing for yourself, here are a few highlights of this year’s gala awards ceremony held that the Wynn hotel in Las Vegas:

* The thing started out with a music video set to Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe.” This music video is so cringe-inducingly awful that you will swear it was created by Michael Scott from The Office. [@01:18]

* Because Jack LaLanne isn’t around for them to give awards to anymore, Jay Kordich received the “Best Male Presenter” trophy. It will surprise no one that during his acceptance speech Kordich went off on a tangent about the health benefits of fresh juice, spoke over his allotted time, kept talking over the music, and needed to be pulled off the stage by his wife. [@1:15:58]

* Those of you who have the hots for Mimi Umidon (and you know who you are) will be happy to hear that she was a presenter at this year’s awards. She wore an evening gown and made a lame joke about the Magic Bullet. [@1:12:28]

* Montel Williams was awarded a “DR Icon Award” because his “personal brand and extraordinary talent have re-shaped direct response marketing.” And Montel did indeed deserve it.

In the 1980s, early TV infomercials tried hard to fool people into thinking they were watching a real talk show or news program. This caused much outrage among consumer protection advocates, and there was talk that Congress or the FCC would move to strictly regulate or even ban infomercials from the airwaves. In response the infomercial industry did two things: 1) They formed the National Infomercial Marketing Association (NIMA), which was later renamed the Electronic Retailing Association (ERA) 2) They made less of an effort to trick viewers into thinking infomercials weren’t advertisements.

Now, years later, Montel Williams has brought the infomercial industry full circle. Because he started making infomercials after a 17-year career as a prominent talk show host, Montel has taken that old idea—to fool infomercial viewers into thinking they are watching a legitimate, unbiased talk show—to a whole new level. Or, as it was described at the ceremony, “combining the proven success of direct response with the emotion of daytime talk and the uniquely personal connection millions have made with Montel.” Well done, Montel! [@1:28:53]

* One of the presenters at the award ceremony was a man named Elliott Segal, the Vice President of Production for Guthy-Renker Japan. Last year his co-presenter, Forbes Riley, forced him to feel her up. This year his co-presenter was some woman named Tracy Metro who made frequent references to her breasts and said, “This is my virgin time at the Moxies, so Elliott, you are popping my cherry.” Maybe the guy uses pheromones. [@1:45:43]

If you are really masochistic, you may watch the whole two hour and twenty minute ceremony for yourself:

Just don’t say you weren’t warned!

I, unfortunately, felt bound by conscience to boycott the Moxie Awards ceremony yet again—this year in protest that the Squatty Potty infomercial was not even nominated in any category! It’s an outrage I tell you, an outrage!!