A Creative Communications Agency

Let me tell you, my bladder hates Super Bowl Sunday.  I am a big football fan and I watch the whole game. Usually I take my restroom breaks during the commercials. On Super Bowl Sunday, though, advertisers are strutting their stuff for the huge global audience. Working in the advertising field, I am compelled to watch the commercials, so that I will be current and topical during Monday’s water cooler talk. Thankfully the NFL has decided to use aging rockers for the past several years (thanks, a lot Janet and Justin), so I do get a break at halftime.

On the whole I have to say I was disappointed with the batch this year. It seemed like most advertisers decided to show existing spots. The few new spots were very forgettable.

I feel the best commercial was Hyundai’s spot were they are letting people who buy their vehicles return them if they get laid off in the next year. Gee, using mass media to communicate a differentiating message. The people at Goodby, Silverstein & Partners may be on to something.

I’m sorry Pepsi and Bud, but I can’t even recall your spots this year. It’s not like you ever were delivering a message in years past. It was more case of sponsoring your own commercial which is, in turn, sponsoring the game.

GoDaddy, you may want to stop using in-house people to produce your spots. Maybe you don’t care though that you are used as a prime example of how not to make an ad. You fail to mention any concise product benefits; your spots are not funny, clever, emotional; and you could use 5 million dollars in better ways.

Seeing Ed McMahon sell his pride to hock Cash4gold is just sad. I have to admit, I’ve never seen the appeal of Ed McMahon. Here’s a person who has been successful and famous without any real talent. I lump him in with Vanna White, Paris Hilton, Ryan Seacrest and the like. I guess GoDaddy and Cash4Gold are examples of the old adage “There’s no such thing as bad publicity”.  I would be curious to see what would happen if they put all of that money towards something good.

Then we have a darlings of the Super Bowl ads. The Herbert brothers and their Doritos spot. It seems to have won the various ad-tracking awards. And it takes the torch from Bud and Pepsi. Will throwing a snow globe through a vending machine and at someone’s crotch lead to sales of more chips? I doubt it.

I save my worst for last. The Teleflora spot (yet another bad example of using in-house agencies) was hideous. The horrible copy was only outdone by the message that flowers in a box are somehow worse than flowers delivered in other containers. It wasn’t funny, it wasn’t interesting, and it didn’t even make sense. After seeing it, I was struck with the feeling of “what did I just watch”.

By the way, that was one great game.