Picture the scene. It’s mid-morning on a particularly wet Bank Holiday Monday in Surrey. Everyone is bored. The youngest is playing Nerf guns upstairs with his friend. The oldest is practicing beat boxing on the laptop. The Mrs has gone shopping.
And I’m reading The Times when I come across an article titled ’6 of the Best’. In it John Hegarty, advertising ‘guru’, lists his all-time favourite TV adverts in the UK.
BTW this is not one of Hegarty’s favourites, this is a cheap attempt at humour.
The article includes a picture of a shot of each campaign and at this point I thought ‘Shame you can’t watch the actual ad whilst you’re reading the article’. Which of course is what The Times wants you to think, so no doubt they have the adverts available in their online version of the article.
Problem is, no way I’m paying to subscribe to online news from The Times. Forget it. Its just plain irritating that they expect you to pay when a year or so ago you could read it for free. I mean why all of a sudden should you pay?
That’s when it struck me – use the power of WordPress to bring life to this flat, static article I’m reading and so here is Hegarty’s favourites (with help from Youtube):
1. Hovis, 1974
This ad was voted as the UK’s all time best. And it was directed by none other than Ridley Scott who went on to make Alien and Bladerunner.
2. Heineken, 1984
My favourite. It sums up us Brits so well.
3. Levi’s, 1985
This is one of Hegarty’s commercials and he says it revived the brand, that music and the boxer short. But these things are fleeting and none of then are particularly popular now…are they? (To be fair it did enable Levis to start charging stupid amounts for denim though).
4. Smash, 1974
Smash – bloody horrible stuff.
5. Fiat, 1979
This advert shows the pure power of marketing – it made what was in reality a totally shit car seem okay. The music (Pavarotti) and the focus on computer production confused the viewer into thinking that Fiat could produce cars. They couldn’t.
6. Orange, 2003
In the UK we get ads like this in cinemas. They are quite funny but the problem is that you know by the time you see them the film is about to start and you’ve been sitting there so long you just want it to get going!
So these are all famous adverts from history we have seen on UK TV and cinema screens – what about the rest of the world? What’s your favourite advert?
Great post! My fav vintage is 1991 Brad Pitt Levis http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdaKNHWi1SQ But my current favorite is Bud Light, especially this one because I work for Mr. way too much cologne wearer http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ik6QzSgrqZ4
Great post – this is my favourite at the moment – Ikea kitchens!
Its a great advert which once again outperforms the product (I have a deconstructed Ikea cupboard in the boot of the car right now)
PS Your daughter has watched the Heineken ad about 10 times. She is currently saying I am the guy with the beer and she is the Eliza character
What a great post! I had so much fun reading it and seeing some of these ads. I remember the Orange one. They had a whole series of these and they were all funny. Are they still making them?
Personally, I thought the new-ish Old Spice commercials were brilliant.
Orange do still do ads but this is the most recent one we have seen:
Years ago I was sitting in a laundromat waiting for my wash to finish & a guy really did come in, strip down & was his clothes – just like the levi’s commercial. I’m guessing it was his only set of clothes so what are ya gonna do? Me, I couldn’t get out fast enough because this guy surely didn’t look like the one in the levi’s ad!!!!
Oh no! Your comment made me laugh out loud. That is just tragic!
It truly was tragic since when I say he washed ALL his clothes, I mean everything! You know what it’s like sitting there waiting for your clothes to at least get out of the washer (forget about drying them cause I was outta there). I mean what do you say? Chilly out huh?
That’s brilliant – shame you couldn’t have recorded it – you could have blogged it with the music!
Hahahaha.. that was awesome entertainment and a great way to start my day!! My fav is the levi’s commercial, I remember it well! Lol!!
Marvel at the advertisement’s ability to stick in your head for years, despite the fact you can live without the product. Commercials I like are the Clint Eastwood car ad and the Coke “I fall to pieces” (sung by Patsy Cline) ad, both run during the Superbowl (not the same year).