It's Our Time!- A 2010 Superbowl Ad Requiem

Hol' Hol' On.....The Superbowl game ads were aight and all but the GAME was waaaaay better!

We are mocking Kanye West's infamous hijacking of Taylor Swift's MTV VMA moment but, my oh my, how we could have used Kanye creatively in one of those spots last night!

Watching the 2010 Superbowl ads validated why a firm like CultureLab has such a bright future. The ad industry demonstrated that they are struggling with relevancy, and diversity of voice. We also think a large number of ads were really off in terms of tonality. CultureLab was able to share this POV post game on the Marcus Graham Project's blog talk radio show.

Here is a quick synopsis of CultureLab's thoughts on this years' Superbowl ad parade:

* Our favorite spot was the "Parisian Love" Google ad: great demonstration of functionality, clever storytelling, and the spot delivered in adding some much needed humanity to Google.



* Our runner up 1- Kia: finally a spot with real energy, a fun concept, cool Kid Robot inspired toys, upbeat music, and to us, it made a mini van type of vehicle (the Sorento) cool!




* Runner Up 2: Dante's Inferno Videogame. We wish we were the team who sold in using Bill Withers' "Ain't No Sunshine" as the music to accompany this ad.



* Runner Up 3: Doritos, The Slap: this was a tad problematic in the premise, the overprotective man/child of a single black mom, but it was kind of funny. I am wondering though if some African Americans cringed a little at the premise as common as it it in real life.



* #FAIL on a glaring lack of diversity specifically, Hispanics and Asians, and over reliance on Black entertainers and athletes for diversity. Double #FAIL on Charles Barkley rapping/rhyming and plugging Taco Bell. Draft FCB, we can do better!

Where is Carlos Mencia when you need him! LOL!



* Beer, this category needs our help.........specifically Anheuser Busch....why do we keep reverting back to frat boy humor? CultureLab can help you evolve your message and make beer a more "inclusive" product. The humor didn't do it for us and you guys even fumbled the Clydesdales! Making fun of Auto Tune is so 2006 and 2007.



* We felt sad for the ad industry by the third quarter of the game. Yes, this was the largest audience ever but what was revealed in a large number of spots is that our industry is in a downward spiral: low production budgets, lack of creativity, and most of all a demonstrated tone deafness (can you say The WHO!?)

*The biggest winner of the Superbowl ad contest for us was Pepsi, who decided NOT to advertise this year during the big game. Their move was brilliant in that the Refresh Project showed real insight as to what is relevant for the core Pepsi consumer. It also is a very smart deployment of money compared to many advertisers who chose to spend big for the slot but put in place low quality work.

Nice move Pepsi and we think next year, there will be even more companies making decisions like Pepsi did when it comes to advertising during the Superbowl game.