The Biggest And Best F*ck Ups Of 2016, According To B&T

Investigative and authoritative thought piece, or B&T being lazy on the last day of the working year? We’ll let you decide, when you scroll through our list of some of what we thought were the more scandalous, salacious and cringe-worthy cock ups of 2016.

From countless on-air gaffes and media messes, to agency scandals and indiscretions, 2016 had it all, and then some. It was the year Trump got elected President, after all. To be honest, we’re quite happy to see it finally come to a close.

In no particular order, here’s our favourite fails of the year.

1. Weather girl disasters

2016 was the year of the weather girl for B&T, gifting us with not only our top story of the year, but plenty more. These included:

You could say B&T’s editor has a thing for weather presenters.

2. Print took a big hit in 2016

2016 was the year we farewelled iconic titles like Dolly, and Cleo, both Bauer titles, while at Pacific a stack of other publications were dropped, K-Zone and Total Girl were sold off, and Girlfriend dropped circulation again to “seasonal”.

There were also talks that Bauer Media might swallow up Pacific Magazines, with talks of a merger in the works, while all three major publishers dropped out of the AMAA circulation audits, switching to slightly shadier readership figures of emma.

3. PETA pissed off everybody

From comparing rape victims to animals and getting Alicia Silverstone in the nude, it was a big year for PETA. Some of their highlights included:

4. Seven CEO Tim Worner got caught with pants down

A recent story from this week was Seven West Media CEO Tim Worner getting busted for an affair he had with a previous employee years ago before he took on the top job.

Amber Harrison went public with the affair after her settlement agreements weren’t met, while Seven continued to support Worner as CEO, despite saying it would launch an independent inquiry into the matter.

5. The Monkeys enraged the vegans with Australia Day ad

Lee Lin Chin summoning Aussies back to the homeland for Australia Day and some lamb was a stroke of advertising genius, until vegans took offence to the bit where their house was torched for not eating meat. Awkward.

The ad became the most complained about ad of the year, nay, EVER, beating the controversial Ashley Madison ‘cheating on my wife’ jingle from 2014.

6. Sunrise made for cringe-worthy television

Sunrise hosts Kochie and Samantha Armytage were at the helm of a few blunders on live television this year, and it was entertaining to say the least. Here’s our favourites:

7. Nine and Seven at war over breakfast shows

Speaking of Seven, it can’t go unnoticed that it got into a kerfuffle with rival Nine’s Today Show over who won the breakfast war, with both citing different metric systems. It almost went to court, and to date no one really knows who was the clear winner.

8. M&C Saatchi held a party with controversial entertainment

By now everyone is familiar with the furore that erupted off the back of a celebration hosted by M&C Saatchi.

The party had burlesque dancers as main entertainment, and while B&T backed the agency, with nothing to say except thanks for a ripper party, a few others were unimpressed with the event. M&C Saatchi later apologised.

9. B&T published awards winners five hours early

Speaking of parties, we won’t pretend any longer that we didn’t completely cock this one up, hitting the ‘Publish’ button on the coveted awards winners story a few too many hours before the actual results were announced.

We’re sorry about ruining the surprise, but from the bar tab at the end of the night, it seemed like you all enjoyed yourselves anyway.

10. We were gifted the ‘fake tradie’

A Liberal ad ahead of the Federal Election starred a peeved tradie drinking a cup of coffee on a job site, telling viewers that Shorten “wants to go to war with someone like me, who just wants to get ahead with an investment property”.

It was mocked mercilessly for being a “fake tradie”, and resulted in a hunt from media outlets to find out just who this tradie was.

After #faketradie went a little bit viral, the Liberal party confirmed he was not in fact an actor, but a real tradie with a license and everything. Still not as bad as Stoner Sloth, however.

And that’s a wrap from B&T – if we’ve missed any mammoth stuff ups, scandals or otherwise controversial tidbits, tweet us at @bandt. See you next year to do it all again!

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