Midwest Hemorrhoid Treatment Center

This is the first commercial that I saw upon my return to visit family in St. Louis for Thanksgiving.  Yes, a commercial for the Midwest Hemorrhoid Treatment Center.

Advertising for the not quite ready for primetime physical ailments has always been a little shaky for companies advertising products for bladder irregularities, herpes, or hemorrhoids, among countless other ailments.  But what’s special about the Midwest Hemorrhoid Treatment Center is not only the Cable Access quality film footage they display, but also that they created a witty little jingle for themselves.

Let’s break this commercial down together, shall we?

- The child running up to the portly women at the .10 second mark.  Obviously this image is saying to all those mothers who got hemorrhoids because of pregnancy/childbirth, “Don’t hate your annoying child for giving you hemorrhoid’s, the Midwest Hemorrhoid Treatment Center can help.”  Think of a mother suffering from postpartum depression AND hemorrhoids?  Talk about angry mama!

- They lay it out there, “Don’t suffer in silence.”  They want you to tell your co-workers, friends, family, “I have hemorrhoids, and I’m just like you.”  Well, yes, sort of, except that you’re the weird guy at the water cooler who shares a little too much about their private life at work.

- It’s fast, painless, and you can get back to work in no time!  You can even go running, have a BBQ, golf.

- Have you noticed that many of the people featured in the video have a weight problem?  Is this a symptom of hemmorroids, or is it just that the Midwest has an obescity problem?

- Why call it the Midwest Hemorrhoid Treatment Center?  Wouldn’t Hemorrhoid Treatment Center suffice?  Is there a Northeast Hemorrhoid Treatment Center?

- The last line in the jingle, “Don’t suffer in silence.”  They are really stressing this point.  I’m imagining a man sitting in his boxers eating Fruit Loops at 2 AM, seeing this commercial and thinking, “You’re so right, I don’t have to suffer this way anymore,” cue tears.

The people who produced this spot should make regionally specific commercials for Hemorrhoid Centers.  In the Northeast they’d have a guy eating a slice of pizza going, “Yo, does taking a dump make you cringe?  It ain’t you, it’s the hemorrhoids.”  The Hollywood version would feature a has been celebrity, perhaps Lindsay Lohan in a couple of years, “Hey guys, Lindsay Lohan here.  Right after Mean Girls it started to hurt everytime I went number 2.  I thought it was all the drugs and alcohol, but no, it was hemorrhoids.”

So guys, don’t suffer in silence, mmmmkay?!