Balls to adverts

Around this time every year the US is brought to a standstill as Super Bowl Sunday comes around. However, just as important as the plays, the sacks, the wide receivers and the quarter backs are the ads that are sandwiched in between the gridiron action. 30-second spots can go up to a staggering $3 million, but brands arguably get value for money, with last year's ads from Coca-Cola, Doritos and Budweiser et al being viewed by a national audience of around 93 million people. As the sporting and ad bonanza is due to take place this weekend, we decided to take a look at what the brands rich enough to present their wares to a captive audience of millions of football fans offered up last year...and then compare it to our very own FA Cup Final, because we're creative like that.

Let’s ignore the fact that we just can’t compete with the kind of figures I’ve already mentioned above - around 12 million people watched the FA Cup Final in homes last year and over 75% of those watched it on the ad-free BBC – we’re only interested in the ads themselves. The comparison makes much more sense that way.

Last year’s Super Bowl featured a victory for the Indianapolis Colts against the Chicago Bears and, considering American television’s penchant for ad breaks, probably around 100 ads, including Coca-Cola ‘Happiness Factory’, Budweiser ‘Mind of Mencia’ and Chevrolet ‘Car Wash’. Sky Sports 1’s coverage of an exceedingly lacklustre FA Cup Final victory for Chelsea against Man Utd treated us to ads including WKD ‘Robot’, Bulmer’s ‘Born for Ice’ and Honda’s ‘Hondamentalism’. Although we intend to leave the examples at three on each side, a special mention also has to go to the odd/bold (delete as applicable) screening of Flomax ‘Biking’ stateside.

‘Happiness Factory’ pretty much sums up the Super Bowl: much-hyped, big, expensive and spectacular. For our sporting showcase event there was nothing to touch it in terms of scale, but Bulmer’s ‘Born for Ice' is similar in the way CGI is used to create a pleasing ad that is designed to get the predominantly male audiences supping from a bottle (or can).

WKD and Bud Light have three things in common – which we know about, anyway: they’re alcoholic drinks; they’re alcoholic drinks that have a less than masculine reputation; they’re alcoholic drinks with a less than masculine reputation that aired humourous ads in the ad breaks of major sporting events last year. We're not sure about the Bud spot - Carlos Mencia is a stranger around these parts - but The Reel editorial team can attest to the fact that ‘Robot’ was a great creative success, with many friends and family getting out their drills, none of them have drunk a WKD in our presence though. C'est la vie.

Honda’s ‘Hondamentalism’ was another addition to what has been a consistently great series of ads from the creative minds at Wieden + Kennedy, London. Ever since the seminal ‘Cog’ broke in 2003 they’ve been churning out top-notch creative that has put the Honda brand in the hearts and minds of many. Chevrolet, on the other hand, challenged College kids throughout America to come up with an ad to feature in their Super Bowl spot. The winner was University of Wisconsin student Katelyn Crabb; her victorious idea is not particularly subtle, unlike the Honda spot, but then again, that’s not what the Super Bowl is about.

Well, there you go: an intuitive and enlightening case study on the differences and similarities between us and our cousins over the Atlantic, concisely delivered under the pretence of looking at ads. Don’t fret, though, we’ll get back to doing what we do best next week: watching pretty pictures…whilst downing WKDs.