The latest victim of the pandemic? This year’s harvest Super Bowl ads.
Critics said most Super Bowl LV ads struggled under the typical pitfalls of Super Sunday, or they were too safe and worded, or they were caught up with celebrities and bad ideas. Experts blamed the production challenges, as the advertisers had to walk away from the cord, given the divided political climate and COVID’s rising death toll.
“Every year in Super Bowl commercials there are the good, the bad and the ugly,” said Rob Schwartz, CEO of advertising agency TBWA Chiat Day. “This year there was not enough good and there were more ugly.”
A major exhibit was the Scott’s Miracle-Gro ad which, while one of the few places to point out the pandemic, said backyards had ‘a whole year’ but got stuck with a strange mix of celebrities from Martha Stewart, NASCAR driver Kyle Busch. and an almost unrecognizable John Travolta.
“It was a train wreck,” Schwartz said. ‘The Super Bowl is an arms race of celebrities, but the problem is the random celebrity for the garden party in the backyard. I thought, ‘What am I looking at?’ It was very confusing. ”
On top of that, this year the advertisers had to contend with the cruel and taboo headlines over the past year with the persistent ‘hype’ and pressure associated with a Super Bowl spot and the hefty $ 5.5 million price tag for an ad of 30 seconds. said.
“The amount you pay alone makes people conservative,” Schwartz said. “Everyone looks at what has been successful in the past: celebrity, puppy and baby.”
This could have been a problem for the Robinhood trading app, which faltered with an ad clearly conceived ahead of the recent GameStop frenzy. Robinhood tried to appeal to the everyday person when he used photos of ordinary people doing normal things like petting a stranger’s dog, jogging and FaceTiming.
“You do not have to be an investor, you are born one”, the narrator concludes the ad.
The CEO called the 30-second spot a ‘real flop’. ‘Robinhood actually delivered the biggest sin of the Super Bowl Spot. What they made was boring. If you’ve bored, you’re done. ‘
In contrast, Reddit, also at the center of the recent scandal for commercial madness, had a unique, disruptive five-second ad that flashed images as if it were a car ad before posting a text:
“If you read it, it means that our commitment is bearing fruit,” reads the message. “One thing we’ve learned from our communities over the past week is that subjects can achieve virtually anything if we come together in a common environment.”
Another fragrance was Fiverr’s location with the Four Seasons Total Landscaping Company in Philadelphia, where Rudy Giuliani in an apparent conspiracy held a press conference for Trump’s presidential campaign instead of in the Four Seasons Hotel. In the ad, the president of the landscaping company, Marie Siravo, drove a futuristic golf cart into the now famous sloppy garage entrance to reveal a lush botanical dream landscape filled with busy workers guarding butterflies and waterfalls.
In addition to the polarization, Fiverr’s ad did not have clarity on who Siravo was, what Fiverr does, and how her business fits in, said Bill Oberlander, co-founder and executive creative director of advertising agency Oberland.
“There’s a saying ‘it’s a long way to go for a ham sandwich,’ Oberlander said. “If these are the rings you have to go through to make a point, it might not be worth a Super Bowl ad.”
M&M usually scored the best points for its funny ad, featuring Dan Levy, in which a bag of M&M was offered as an excuse.
“I’m sorry for manslaughter,” a man said as he offered a bag of M&M to a younger woman.
“It was a man then,” he said before the woman interrupted him to complain further. “I know what it is,” she said.
GM’s ad urging Americans to buy more electric cars, featuring Will Ferrell and co-comedians Kenan Thompson and Awkwafina, also received Oberlander’s best marks for its ability to weave a purposeful message with humor.
Norway is currently the best seller of electric cars. “Well, I would not stand for that,” Ferrell said as he hit a globe in the ad. ‘With GM’s new Ultium battery, we’re going to smash the air tanks. Crush them! Let’s go to America. ”