There was a topic a couple Christmases ago about the Staples commercial that was unflattering to knitting and actually showed crocheted items while disparaging knitting.

Last night I saw this new Yoplait yogurt commercial and at least this one actually featured knitted items. It showed a young girl knitting something humongous, she was wearing a huge hot pink beret and there were ugly knitted lampshades, afghans, etc. all over the apartment. She said "as long as I am knitting I can keep my mind off all the things I can't eat on my new diet". Then it cut to pictures of Yoplait, etc. And then at the end, her boyfriend/brother/husband walked in the room scratching his armpits and wearing a badly knitted green basketball jersey with white trim (Boston Celtics, right?) with the number 22 crookedly knit into it and he says, "honey, this is too hot". (I'm assuming this means she made sports clothes out of wool. )

I really take offense at these nasty commercials. They seem to imply that knitters have no taste at all, and will knit even ugly stuff just to keep knitting. Or maybe we are supposed to be so stupid that we don't even know what is ugly.

I'm not a huge yogurt fan, but I do eat it occasionally. I will try to avoid Yoplait and choose Dannon instead. Do any of you get offended when you see this stupid stuff?

Marilyn,
I remember the Staples commercial. The had so much flack from knitters that they took it ioff the air.
My first time back to the board for a number of years.
Dorothy

Dorothy, good to hear from you again. I'm so glad you remembered that Staples commercial. I am glad that they listened to the 'flak' and took it off the air, too. I understand that they want to sell their product in this competitive world, but I don't think they have to poke fun at or put down people to do it.

I missed both of those commercials, but I want to know what knitter helped to make those things? Even if machine knit, it still had to be made by someone, right? So who was willing to make fun of the very craft that is helping them make money. Talk about cutting of your nose to spite your face!
I sometimes ate Yoplait because they donate to a breast cancer cause, but anymore, I make my own yogurt thanks to knitterb!

I have no TV but miss out on these things---


I guess we need to write some letters to them any one have an email address???

I'll do the yogurt making instructions again if anyone is interested. Pooh to Yoplait! and pooh to the rest of them also! I have my home made yogurt in half gallon quantities at the cost of a half gallon of milk. I add my own fruit and sweetening if I like and no other additives. It's also a good substitute for sour milk, buttermilk, and even sour cream for some things.

I googled the yoplait site and punched contact us and sent the following:
this is a complaint about your latest tasteless commercial. In the commercial you show someone with many pieces of ugly hand knitting. the statement being that knitting keeps her mind off her hunger.
The ugly knitting gives the impression that knitting is ugly, boring, useless and laughable.
there are somewhere around six million knitters in the USA, who knit with passion and interest. They have a large discretionary budget and take their art and craft seriously. I for one of them will never willingly spend money with a company that denigrates a large part of my life. you have just been expunged from my shopping list due to your disrespectful commercial.

Feel free to copy, revise and bombard.
please post your yogurt recipe again, knitterb, I use a lot of it.

Just visited the Yoplait site and put in my two cents' worth. More, everyone - MORE!

Strikker

Everyone up in arms at this!!! Me, too. I have not seen this commercial since, so maybe Yoplait has gotten the negative feedback already. I was thinking that maybe we should be happy they featured a young attractive knitter rather than the usual elderly grandmotherly stereotypes used. And I would be willing to grant them that knitting can take your mind off your diet's forbidden fruits. What really irked me more than anything else was the poor quality of the knitted items, especially that pathetic green jersey and the number 22 was so obviously crooked too. Because the number was knitted into the fabric (intarsia) she had to start the bottom of the numbers on two different rows, like she deliberately messed it all up.

I definitely agree with Diana:

quote:

I want to know what knitter helped to make those things? Even if machine knit, it still had to be made by someone, right? So who was willing to make fun of the very craft that is helping them make money. Talk about cutting of your nose to spite your face!

. . . talk about the ultimate betrayal!!! I hope they paid you very well (I wonder how much)!

I was thinking about this again last night, and maybe instead of blasting negativity at Yoplait, we could show them how to put a positive spin on it.

Imagine this, two attractive young girls knitting something skimpy and one saying, "you know, since I've started knitting it really does help keep my fingers busy and my mind off all that fattening junk.". And the other girl would say something like, "I agree knitting is fascinating and if I eat Yoplait I can have my snack and still fit into all of my wonderful new outfits". They could even say something like, "I've lost so much weight with Yoplait that with the economy being so bad it sure does make sense to save a lot money by knitting my smaller form-fitting fashions".

Nope, I saw it on TV this evening and pointed it out to my husband.

I wonder if the media people ever get it right. I remember the bathroom tissue being knitted, not quilted..... Waiting for the recipe. I read that if you strain it over night you can use it for sour cream. I can taste the onion dip. The lamp shades are real winners. some knitter went to a lot of work. So glad that you are back Knit-n-up, I also remember your curtains.... Grace, Love and Prayers. God Bless.

I saw the commercial this past Saturday or Sunday. I don't remember which channel, but maybe USA or Discovery or TNT. That's what I had on the most this weekend. Hubby saw it and he started to laugh! He didn't quite realize until I pointed it out to him, just what an insult that was to all us knitters. He watches me knit, but has no clue how to do it, so he didn't quite "get" all of the gags. I must admit, that if I wasn't a knitter, I probably would have found it amusing also. When reading some history of knitting, there were a lot of cartoons from the WW1 days when many inexperienced or new knitters made many silly mistakes like gauge or dropping stitches and the like.
As for the homemade yogurt, I do drain off some of the excess liquid because we like it a bit thicker. I dump a quart at a time into a cheesecloth and let it drain over a bowl in the fridge for about 1/2 hour and then when I add the fruit, it's not so watery. You can substitute this for some or all of sour cream to get the same texture without all the fat and calories. Great for dips and stuff!

Also waiting for the recipe for the yogurt.

Okay, here we go on the yogurt recipe. You need a microwaveable container with a lid that will hold 1/2 gallon, and a good thermometer and a small container of plain yogurt with live cultures. In this area I use Nancy's or Trader Joe's Organic by preference but I don't think either of these are available nation wide. Put your 1/2 gallon of milk, whole, 2%, 1%, skim, goat, raw, mare's, or anything available in the microwave without the lid, Zap at full power for about 15 minutes. It needs to boil to toughen the curd slightly since you will not be adding modified food starch, pectin, or any other thickener. Cool the hot milk to between 90 and 120 degrees. If your culture is cold you can stretch to 125 degrees, but hotter may kill the yogurt bacteria. Stir in at least a generous tablespoon of your culture yogurt. After the first time you use the leftover small amount from your previous batch. Give the mixture a good stir, put the lid on and wrap the container in a couple of old bath towels to incubate and push it off out of the way. Leave it for at least 8 hours and you have yogurt. Diane's method of draining is good. If you drain it really dry it can be used like cottage cheese or ricotta. I recently had a batch ferment; it smelled a bit sharp and was bubbling slightly. Since I'm really cheap and did not want to discard it I used it as the liquid for a batch of bread. I did add some regular yeast, but my bread turned out really well, fine texture, good crust and with a lovely tender crumb. Have fun, remember if someone's little old granny could do this you can too, and it's not nearly as complex as socks.