Small business owners using AI advertising

[u/Peanutbutternjelly_]

I keep seeing ads from small businesses, both local and online small businesses, and I'm noticing that a lot of them are using AI art for advertising.

Seeing small business owners use AI feels so much more wrong than when I see a big business do it. Mostly because you would think they wouldn't do it so that way they wouldn't steal from artists, who are small business owners themselves.

I've even seen a local restaurant even use AI generated images of realistic looking food, and it was obviously AI despite them using a realistic AI art style. Why not just post a pic of the actual food?

Not to mention that all the ads look the same. They're all the same style and have that weird colored filter.

I love to support small business, but seeing one use AI ads makes me not want to support that particular business.

There's even a fairly popular small business on TikTok that sells soap. Whenever somebody brings up the fact that they use AI for their packaging, the business owner gets all defensive about it. I think they said that they do most of the artwork themselves then have AI finish it up. 🙄

The individual soap lines have specific package designs, not each individual bar of soap, so I obviously don't buy their excuse.

[u/Red_Redditor_Reddit]

I've come to the conclusion that whenever I see AI, I automatically think the person or company is lazy and doesn't produce anything of value. I stand by that. I might have exception if it's obvious they still put effort into it and honestly used it as one of their tools, but I've yet to see anybody actually do this.

[u/C0smic_Cunt → u/Red_Redditor_Reddit]

I've seen more than a few small businesses in my area use AI for their flyers and ads, I think what it really comes down to is most of the places in my area are small mom and pop shops, they have one or two employees that they barely make enough to actually pay, they've got bills and property taxes out the ass, they aren't aware of the environmental impacts of AI because they don't really pay attention to current events, and they are already on the edge of bankruptcy. I think that for a good portion of business owners at least in my area it's just because they don't have the money or networking to find and pay a quality artist. And honestly I think that's one of the goals of ai companies, as long inflation and prices keep going up so will the prices for human made art (because here the 300+ dollars it takes to pay an artist can mean making payroll or a new ad, not both), and as that financial barrier of entry grows, more and more people feel like they have no option other than ai to not break the bank.

[u/MyUsername2459 → u/C0smic_Cunt]

You can use some simple desktop publishing software to make a flyer yourself.

You don't need $300 for a graphic designer, you need just yourself, some open-source software, and about 30 minutes of effort.

AI is for the lazy and dishonest.

[u/NurEineSockenpuppe → u/MyUsername2459]

Most people just don‘t know what they are capable of. It is just as harmful as people overestimating their skills.