Post 4: Super bowl forty eight.

Super bowl 48’s advertisements focused on family, friends, and what a vehicle, cup of yogurt, or new movie can do to positively impact the world. While many ads had an innocent, feel-good communication channel to the consumer, other advertisements created a whole new spin on what is ethical to air on TV.

1) What was the best advertisement, and why?

One of the top best advertisements was for Budweiser, entitled “Puppy Love.” It showed a yellow lab and a farm horse falling in love while the man and woman featured in the commercial grew emotionally connected through the animals. The hashtag at the end read “Budweiser: #bestbuds,” reiterating the message of the product creating an undeniable connection between two people or two animals. One of the reasons this advertisement worked so well was because of the music that was used to encode the message of love and friendship. Budweiser used a well-known currently popular song (Let Her Go by Passenger) that sang, “only know you love her when you let her go…” to channel the message of undeniable love and kinship that Budweiser beer offers to the consumer.

My personal favorite advertisement was for Goldie Blox, a new line of toys targeted towards young girls who have dreams to be female engineers or other male-dominated professions. The song during the commercial says, “more than pink pink pink we want to think think think.” This new toy line offers new options for young girls who want to break out of the binary of “pink is for girls, blue is for boys / dress up is for girls, building is for boys.” The ad also caters to the other important audience, the parents, who are the consumers of this product because they purchase for their children. This ad is attractive because it is similar, likeable, and familiar in the ways of children playing with toys, young girls choosing a new toy line that caters to their likes, and the average consumer familiarizing themselves with children liking toys that are good for them.

2) What was the worst advertisement, and why?

The worst advertisement was for Axe’s War and Peace body spray for men. It discriminates against communities from foreign countries, showcasing their acts of war on other people. The ad only matches with Axe’s body spray name, but it does not fit with the actual product and the lack of relation between an American teenage boy’s scent and how it infuses love or war into the world. As Belch describes source credibility, this advertisement does not include “honesty, belief or skill” into the advertisement. It gives off phoniness to how credible it is.

3) What was the best use of humor, and why?

The Cheerios commercial uses a young African American girl asking for a puppy after her dad tells her that she’s going to be having a little brother. The ad portrays funny, quirky family characteristics as well as advertising an interracial family to America. It includes successful communication techniques because it targets the source of family, gives the message of Cheerios being a family-cereal, targets a family-oriented audience, and may receives positive feedback from consumers who enjoy the cereal and the feeling of closeness it brings.

4) Were any advertisements ethically questionable, and why?  (This can include a discussion of sexist ads, if applicable)

-Dannon Oikos yogurt commercial insinuated to a woman performing sexual favors just for a spilled bite of Danna yogurt. While the commercial included a humorous aspect by the 3 former Full House actors, it shows a woman giving up her dignity for something as simple as food while attempting to portray this product as irresistible, sexual, and necessary. The use of celebrity endorsers worked well in this ad because it showed men cleaning the house and creating a bond between friends who function as parents together. The humor may have only reached a niche market though: consumers who watched Full House in the 80s and 90s.

5) What was the best (if any) advertisement for an environmental or sustainability related product, service or issue?

-Soda Stream features Scarlet Johansson explaining that she (and the product) help save the world by reducing plastic bottle waste. The first few seconds showed how the Sodastream worked and why it would help reduce waste in the environment but the rest of the 20-second clip featured Johansson promoting the product with her sexual-infused physique, completely undermining the message of what the Sodastream can do for the world. Sodastream’s advertising tactic was to use a celebrity source to encode a message about the product helping the world be a better place. Johansson has a positive public image, despite events that she has been involved in in the past. However, she may now be publicly scrutinized because of the way she portrayed a soft-drink machine.