The "Anti-Irritation Zone"

Edge Shave Gel is curing more than razor irritation these days. Edge has recently launched a new interactive ad campaign that's more concerned about your problems than it is your face. By following Edge via its @EdgeShaveZone Twitter handle and using the #soirritating hashtag, Edge is slowly developing a following of complainers as part of a long-term campaign with big aspirations to own the position of irritation prevention.

The shave gel brand is doing more than just listening to your problems; their solving them. Matthew DeCoste, an interactive designer at Euro RSCG, New York, a devout New England Patriots fan was irritated last month at his inability to get tickets to a game against the New York Jets, he tweeted his issues to the Edge shaving gel brand. Within days, the football fan had tickets to the game compliments of the "anti-irritation" campaign. Edge has also sent a megaphone to a University of Alabama professor who said her husband wasn't listening to her and a Blu-ray disc player and the movie "Office Space" on DVD to ease the irritation of an employee annoyed by a coworker.

"We may find someone who's really irritated about the traffic jam they're in and offer to send them a GPS unit," said Jeffrey Wolf, senior brand manager at Edge. "Or maybe someone's tweeting about being stuck in the rain. Well, we've got an umbrella with your name on it. The other day we gave a guy whose hard drive had crashed a brand new one." Edge is slowly developing an irritated group of followers and its certain the the group will swell to viral proportions once people find out Edge is willing to provide solutions to their irritating problems.

The brand has also started an "anti-irritation community" on its website, which encourages its visitors to enter complaints that are "irritating" into their "Anti-Irritation Index". The index is search friendly and it breaks the complaints down by state so you can easily see what people are bitching about close to home!

The brand says it has bigger things in store for the effort, including undisclosed work coming later this year under development by WPP's JWT, New York, promo shop Ryan Partnership and media shop MEC. "What I'm most encouraged about is where we're going to take this brand moving forward with this robust campaign we'll roll out within the next year," Mr. Wolf said.

I love this campaign. Edge Shave Gel is pushing their brand forward and setting the social media standards for its competition and the brand interaction it generates with its consumers is invaluable.

And hey, you finally have someone to complain to who actually gives a shit.