Crowley Webb Blog

It’s waaaay better than Airport Plaza Jewelers. It’s Wendy’s.

by Liz Maimone

I’m kind of curious to hear what other people think about Wendy’s. Not about their delicious Frostys, but their advertising. Their stuff never really did anything for me, then all of a sudden this happened. Love it or hate it, it’s arguably the most memorable thing they’ve had since Where’s the Beef? Then they pulled the ads. As a result an irritating animated redhead came to life – on every TV station and in every commercial break. I know I’m a little late to the party since this stuff has been running for months, but I can’t stop thinking about how they completely blew their chance of ever joining the cool kids club. I don’t know, I guess I’m just disappointed because for like a second I saw a glimmer of hope for them. Anyone else feel like chiming in?

In related news, I like redheads again.

Hey Extra, I hate you.

by Liz Maimone

I can’t take it any more. I just have to express my hatred for Extra gum – particularly their TV commercials. It all started with a little gem (and by gem I mean an over-promising piece of crap) that isn’t even worthy of YouTube. If you’ve watched TV in the last six months perhaps the image shown here will be enough to jog your memory. Besides the complete lack of a good idea, its promise to help you “go from nice gut to nice butt” is absolutely ridiculous. Sure, gum is better for you than a doughnut, but so is air. To refer to either as a “snack” is just dumb. Guess who they’re fooling? Not me. And just when it seemed like the torture may be over, they go and do this. Forget gum, I’ll just have a stick of dynamite, please.

It’s not a party until you have pancakes.

by Chris Muldoon

I love breakfast. Not only is it the most important meal of the day, it’s also the most delicious. Waffles, omelets – heck, I even crave the generic bags of cereal you find on the floor of the grocery store. So you can imagine my delight when I saw these commercials for Holiday Inn Express, touting their new hot breakfast bar (with the emphasis on bar).

My favorite spot involves a guy helping himself to some yummy-looking eggs, when a coworker reminds him he’s the designated driver for the morning (now do you get the bar thing?). He sheepishly hands over his plate and says, “I don’t need a hot breakfast to have a good time.” Out of nowhere, another one of his apparent friends yells out, “Yeah, but you’re more fun when you do!”

Wow. Someone cut that lady off from the syrup. She’s definitely going to be hurting by lunchtime.

Great spots, Holiday Inn. And if you need extras for your next campaign, I’ve been known to hit the buffet pretty hard myself.

Shut up, car.

by matt low

Am I the only one driven to the edge of insanity by the latest Volkswagen spots? Probably. Okay, I am exaggerating just a touch. But they do anger me, and I have witnesses. More than the grating accent coming from a ’60s model Bug that sounds like a bad Einstein impression, I just can’t stand the format.

It’s a talk show. Hosted by what’s either some super-intelligent robot-car, or a regular car possessed by a German poltergeist. Featuring guests that range from David Hasselhoff of all has-beens to VW’s new SUV (product placement!). Oh, yeah – there’s also a house band.

I’ll wait while you reread that.

At the risk of offering criticism that can easily be rebutted with the “there’s nothing to get” rebuttal, I don’t get it. And any more talk about this campaign is just going to reignite my anger, so let’s just leave it here. Thanks.

There’s no link because I don’t want to encourage viewing of the spots.

Let’s all laugh at the jerk.

by matt low

Okay, Mike’s Hard Lemonade, I get it. You’re not beer, so you have to find some way to make up for your lack of beerness. Sure, there are plenty of people who cannot tolerate beer but cannot tolerate a family picnic sober. But you certainly can’t come off like mom’s wine coolers to these creatures. So what do you do? You go mean.

You trot out Joey, an overweight but ambitious fellow with a speech impediment who is proudly singing your praises. But just like that, his dreams are wadded up like a silly piece of paper and thrown in his face by some guy who is probably his uncle. He stares at the camera stunned and terrified, and denouncing his belief in a new product of his very own invention. It’s sad really.

Nah, just kidding. It’s really funny. That’s the point, right? Sure, I’d never in a million years buy your product, Mike’s Hard Lemonade, as I consumed you once at a summer concert and was treated to a wicked headache, but I will pay attention to your television commercials and laugh when appropriate. 

Fast food quickly going insane. Again.

by Chris Muldoon

Earlier this month, Matt Low posted an article about a peculiar Burger King ad. Well Matt, I see your slithering sandwich snatcher and raise you this pile of nonsense, compliments of McDonalds in Sweden.

I’m not exactly sure what extra ingredient those crazy Swedes add to their coffee, but I’m fairly confident it’s not in the java here at Crowley Webb. But if these videos are any indication, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Men continue to act stupidly.

by matt low

Male 1 (on cell phone): Hey, guess what? I have cold beer sitting in front of me! Maybe five to six whole bottles!

Males 2, 3, 4, etc. (on cell phones): Wow, cold beer? This is truly remarkable news. I don’t care if I’m at work, getting a haircut, mowing my lawn, or delivering a baby – I’m meeting you at the bar!

This is the basic premise of the new Coors Light commercial. Yes, it features men so enthralled with the thought of cold beer, they drop whatever they are doing and rush to a local pub to meet their friend, the owner of said cold beer. Silly enough, right? But wait, it gets sillier. What may be the most moronic aspect of this abomination is the Silver Bullet’s new feature. It’s a temperature sensitive label that turns blue when cold – which leads the beer-owner in the commercial to summon his band of beer-crazed friends by exclaiming “Code Blue!”

This new feature replaces the outdated and far less practical method of judging a beer’s coldness – touch.

(I couldn’t find the spot online, which is why I have included no link, but rest assured it’s nearly as pointless as what I’ve just written.)

The TV commercial that almost wasn’t.

by Cindy Hennessey

A recent TelevisionWeek special report stated that the best TV commercial in 60 years has to be the “famous Apple commercial” that ran during the Super Bowl in 1984. It turns out Advertising Age named the ad the 1980s “Commercial of the Decade” and in 1999 TV Guide selected it as number one on their list of “50 Greatest Commercials of All Time.” (TV Guide also listed the commercial as #93 on their list of “The Best Moments in TV History” – the only ad on the list.)

I had to check out this famous commercial for myself.

The 60-second spot – which introduced Apple’s Macintosh computer – ran during the third quarter of the Super Bowl. At the time, Nielsen ratings estimated that the commercial reached 46.4 percent of American households (50 percent of all men and 36 percent of women.) Despite costing $800,000 to make and a further $800,000 of airtime, it originally aired on national TV only once.

The ad created such a media frenzy, however, that it garnered many subsequent free TV airings and print mentions. It’s now seen as the first example of event marketing and is popularly credited with starting the trend of yearly “event” Super Bowl commercials.

Ironically, this now-famous commercial almost never aired. “None of the outside board members for Apple liked it,” said Chiat/Day Creative Director Lee Clow. “In fact, they demanded that it not be aired. If it weren’t for the insistence of Steve Jobs during this entire mess this famous commercial never would have made it to a spot in Super Bowl XVIII.”

Note: The Mac commercial was created by ad agency Chiat/Day, with copy written by Steve Hayden and direction by Ridley Scott (who had just finished filming Blade Runner the year before). Creative director Lee Clow was responsible for this and the later Energizer Bunny and Taco Bell chihuahua campaigns.

Oh, Burger King. You’re even wackier in other parts of the world.

by matt low

Okay, I was going to write about the new Burger King ad campaign that made me laugh without the aid of a creepy royal, a daring or subservient chicken (okay, neither chicken made me laugh), or a guy with incredibly tiny hands. It’s the one that features guys so intent on getting burgers, they completely disregard social norms of behavior at drive-thru windows and their own physical safety.

In preparation, I did what I always do – I headed to YouTube so I could watch the spots again and find a link in my piece. I didn’t know the name of the hamburger in question, so I lazily typed in “Burger King,” figuring these were BK’s newest spots and YouTube would do the work for me. Doing so yielded this. (Kind of makes what I was going to write about seem utterly pointless.)

Did you just see that? Seriously, did you? Watch it again.

I really can’t say what is the most amazingly creepy part of this masterpiece – the way the man eats the burger, the fact that he’s stealing the burger, or the reaction of the burger’s rightful owner. But I can say I want to live in the magical universe where this insane piece of genius is considered advertising.

Men, beware!

by matt low

A horribly hideous witch walks the streets with a certain audacity in broad daylight. What ancient evil tortures does she have in store for the mere mortals she is sure to encounter any second now? What’s this? Men seem to be smitten by this creature fashioned by Satan himself. Each looks longingly at her as she passes.

Ah – what diabolical brilliance! She has most certainly conjured a spell that affects the male gender of our species, drawing them foolishly to her. They follow at all costs – no doubt to their certain death once she leads them like sheep to her evil lair with fiendish delight. She smiles at the ease of it all.

Wait, there’s nothing metaphysical about her at all. She’s just an ugly lady who rubbed cashews all over herself. Thanks, Planters.

Bubble wrap is pleasing.

by matt low

Snapple has finally entered the water-with-flavor-so-it’s-not-as-boring-as-regular-water-but-still-called-water-so-you-can-feel-good-about-drinking-it game with its Antioxidant Water. And the commercial that promotes their new product and its health benefit (yes, antioxidants are good for your body) is actually as pleasing as the water may just be (I have yet to try it).

The spot (which, if you haven’t seen, can be found here) features a guy who sips the magical water and thus finds his entire world covered in bubble wrap. The water protects your body – get it?

Okay, it’s a bit of a leap from consuming water with antioxidants to the water actually protecting your body. But the spot is engaging, nonetheless. The sight of city blocks covered in bubble wrap is eerily attractive. And the thought of diving down stairs as if they’re some sort of slide seems like it might be fun. Wait, a thin layer of bubble wrap protecting you from a fall down flights of concrete stairs? Another leap.

Oh come on, it’s that goofy water that everyone is hawking these days. Snapple obviously wanted to stand out and, in my opinion, succeeded. Plus, the spot does contain a “Do not attempt” warning, which I’m still not sure refers to jumping off a skyscraper onto a city street covered in bubble wrap, or the act of covering city block after city block in bubble wrap and then jumping off a skyscraper. Maybe I’ll write and ask that nice lady.

A big old platter of common sense for Super Bowl ads.

An estimated 97.5 million television viewers watched the New York Giants upset the previously unbeaten New England Patriots. As incredible of a rating that is, I'm amazed it wasn't even bigger. The Super Bowl has become such a media free-for-all it's hard to imagine anyone could actually avoid it.

But apparently there are a lot of people who do. If you were one of them, or just want a good chuckle, perhaps you'd be interested in this Miller Brewing Company video. It's a two-minute crash course on this year's Super Bowl commercials, featuring a very opinionated Miller High Life delivery man. What a genius concept - an advertisement critiquing other advertisements. And surprisingly, the commentary is pretty fair, even when they slip in a few jabs towards a certain other alcoholic beverage manufacturer.