I always liked advertising, or more generally, all the techniques associated with the sale of a product, whatever it is. “I love” to see how we are being manipulated at all levels (not counting all that is unknown), and in a manner often brilliant (although…): a single rule for 90% of publicists: the masses. Only few advertisements (specialy video), doesn't make me react, and I wish I could write on them constantly, there's so much to say. Today there are a lot of websites communicating on marketing, but they usually just relay/inform about an ad campaign, I have not yet found one that analyze, dissect, criticize. Besides, if you have links, feel free to share them with me.
Now that you've probably watched the Contrex ad above (not really bad), don't you've been intrigued by a detail? This “2000 calories”. Here Contrex plays the recompense by putting a big number on the small panel, to psychologically let us know their water will better help to lose weight and keep the shape. But let's put this in perspective:
Données de référence
Calories
Power
RPM
Speed
Time
42 kcal
140 W
80
30 km/h
5 min.
To do it, 42 kcal, it's 5 min. of cycling at 80 rpm at 140W, which is ≈ 30 km/h.
Calculations are based on the formula P(W) = Q (kcal) / t(min) / 60 * 1000 = Q (cal) / t(s)
List of equivalences to consume 2000 cal (2 kcal or 2 Cal) :
Calories
Power
RPM
Speed
Time
2 kcal
140 W
80
30 km/h
14s
2 kcal
80 W
–
–
25s
2 kcal
33 W
–
–
1 min.
2 kcal
7 W
–
–
5 min.
If the advertisement is actually referring to 2000 calories, or 2 kcal, it would need (based on the rate and power pre-mentioned) only 14s to spend. Considering that people have provided no real effort (did you noticed how they transpire at the end ^^?), let say 25s… (see second row of the table above). 25s, it's pretty short for a striptease, it's even faster than the ad itself. And 2 kcal (sorry, a big “2000 calories”), this is so trivial that Contrex doesn't give a damn about you!
Note that the riding time during the advertising spot is ≈ 1 min. (beginning at t=0:20, end at t=1:23) for a panel of people more or less young (as you probably noticed). Thus, for 2 kcal burned in 1 min., they should provide and “effort” of 33 W (see third row). But considering that there are cuts, let's start on 5 minutes max. base. Indeed, I doubt that the interest of these “passersby” (no, no, no… no casting here, it's all true) remains beyond. That would give ≈ 7 W. At this power, I'm pretty sure that moving the arm to show the lit facade is more exhausting!
List of equivalences to consume 2000 kcal (200000 cal or 2000 Cal) :
Calories
Power
RPM
Speed
Time
2000 kcal
140 W
80
30 km/h
238 min. ≈ 4h !!!
2000 kcal
6666 W !!!
Disarticulation
Lightspeed?
5 min.
2000 kcal
33333 W !!!
Fusion
Time travel
1 min.
2000 kcal is worth far more credible, however, the fact remains that spend so much in a few minutes is again totally wacky. Note also that energy requirements of the Human are between 1600 and 2600 kcal/day. So if in addition, we burn 2000 Cal, we'll have to eat something more than a bottle of Contrex (its content, not the plastic ^^). Perfect for the “five fruit and vegetables a day”!
2000 calories, what's this?
Definitions of a calorie fall into two classes: • The small calorie or gram calorie (symbol: cal) approximates the energy needed to increase the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 °C. This is about 4.2 joules. • The large calorie, kilogram calorie, dietary calorie, nutritionist's calorie or food calorie (symbol: Cal) approximates the energy needed to increase the temperature of 1 kilogram of water by 1 °C. This is exactly 1,000 small calories or about 4.2 kilojoules. The gram calorie is not used in nutritional contexts. Instead, the large calorie is used. In this context calorie and kilocalorie are equivalent. In an attempt to avoid confusion, the large calorie is sometimes written as Calorie (with a capital C). This convention, however, is not always followed, and not explained to the average person clearly (and is sometimes ambiguous, such as at the beginning of a sentence). Whether the large or small calorie is intended often must be inferred from context. When used in scientific contexts, the term calorie refers to the small calorie; it is often encountered in contexts such as bond and conformational energies in molecular modeling.