THE FENTON EFFECT

You'll know by noy about Fenton that black dog – a Labrador I think – chasing deer in Richmond Park pursued by his despairing owner shouting “Fenton! Fenton!! Oh Jesus Christ!!!”

This was videoed by a 13 year old out with his dad, they thought it was quite funny, posted it on You Tube and it’s gone viral. Well over 1 million hits including spoofs from “Jurassic Park” to “Lost” to Hitler’s last days in the bunker. Fenton has become the name of today. Babies all over the world are being named Fenton. The Fenton film-makers are bemused by their success and are getting richer as we speak.
Why the excitement?

 First of all it isn’t the filming…sorry guys.
Secondly it isn’t the subject which is not a bit PC…poor deer, bad dog, terrible master.
Thirdly it isn’t the best joke ever.
But it spoke to millions.
That name is a key….how many Fentons do you know?

Shane Fenton and the Fentones (later he became Alvin Stardust), Graham Fenton footballer, Fenton House a National Trust property in Hampstead. OK a few but Fenton is a silly name.
And it’s the way it is pronounced by the basso profundo slightly overweight owner clearly having one of the worst days of his life.

Suddenly Fenton became a swearword.

And it touched people because the situation had run out of control and the dog had gone deaf…Fenton!
Phenomena like Fenton and the boy whose baby brother kept on biting his finger are not particularly funny but they are true. In them we recognise something of us and in Fenton a rather upmarket dog who, if he were a human would probably be a right wing Tory.

The speed it has gone from a dog disobeys master to T-shirt, ringtone and parody is fascinating and instructive as to what we want marketing to do for us today. We want our marketing message to spread like a pandemic. We want to be spoken about in pubs and by water coolers. We want to be known in as few words as possible.

“Fenton! Fenton!!! Jesus Christ!!!!” is the anthem for marketing and the dying days of 2011.