-Eleftheria Parpis

NEW YORK Somber music plays as a chimpanzee looking pretty in pink nonchalantly picks its nose. Sweetly looking into the camera, she repeatedly sticks her finger in her nose and then licks her finger.”It’s tough working with monkeys. And we’ve had enough,” reads the on-screen copy. “Watch the CareerBuilder ads evolve. Feb. 4 on the big game.” The ad ends with the chimp giving the camera a proud, toothy grin.

That 30-second commercial is one of two new spots from the Chicago-based company that began running two weeks before the Super Bowl to heighten anticipation for its new campaign, “It’s a jungle out there. “The Super Bowl preview campaign is running on network TV and the client’s Web site.

Super Bowl advertisers have long touted their game buys with leaks to the press and partial previews of their spots in an effort to stretch their ad dollars. Controversial spots historically garner media attention that can add millions of dollars’ worth of “free exposure.” This year, however, an increasing number of advertisers are employing all sorts of supplementary efforts pre- and post-game in order to maximize the value of their $2.6 million ad buy. The approaches are varied, but the intention is the same: generate buzz early and prolong the shelf life of the commercials long after the game

It seems that 90 million viewers just aren’t enough anymore to make the multimillion-dollar buy worth it. So, advertisers are resorting to every form of modern marketing, from user-generated ad contests, video-sharing sites, blogs, mobile advertising and Webisodes, to additional content on brand sites.

The hoopla began earlier than ever this year, when Doritos, the NFL and Chevrolet introduced their Super Bowl stories months in advance, kicking off contests that asked the general public to submit ideas for Super Bowl commercials, back in October.

More skeptical industry observers say Super Bowl XLI is shaping up to be the most “gimmicky” in memory, but others call it smart business. Peter Krivkovich, CEO of CareerBuilder’s agency Cramer-Krasselt, Chicago (whose shop’s work on the Super Bowl dates back to the famous Masterlock series that began in 1974 and lasted through the mid-1990s) says the key to a successful Super Bowl showing is to “merchandise the bejesus out of it.”

At press time, a majority of the advertisers signed up for the game had agreed to contribute their ads to a showcase on the CBS Sportsline Web site, according to a rep for the program. The showcase will be promoted on the home page as well as in short promos during the game’s telecast. The ads will be loaded onto the site at the end of each quarter and will be available for a week after the game.

“It’s no longer just about the additional press you get,” says Tom McGovern, director of sports media at Optimum Sports, a unit of Omnicom’s OMD. “Now the incremental is all these additional places where the commercial is going to be used.”

Halftime sponsor Pepsi last week was still considering how to use its 90 seconds of time. One option: to introduce a campaign tagged “Feel the Pepsi” for its flagship brand with ads from longtime agency BBDO.

To extend the excitement beyond the game, the company has also bought the front page of Yahoo for the day of the game and the day after. Yahoo also built a Web site for the brand, pepsisupercan.com, where people can get a code for a chance to win Super Bowl tickets for life and a diamond-and-jewel-adorned can valued at $100,000. It will also advertise on Yahoo Sports with video spots before and after the game.

All the Internet activity has further cemented the championship game as the preeminent media vehicle to reach a maximum audience. “It’s still the viewing and commercial showcase. Nothing really comes close to it from a viewing, commercial or marketing standpoint,” says Charlie Rutman, North American CEO of Havas’ MPG. “Every client has their own definition of price value, but for every advertiser that is reluctant to get into that spotlight for that price there’s a marketer dying for the opportunity. These digital showcases create more interest and word-of-mouth about the advertising efforts, rather than less.

For two weeks prior to the Super Bowl, visitors to BudLight.com can register to use their mobile phones to vote for their favorite commercials on game day. After Anheuser-Busch’s final spot airs, registrants will receive a text message with a code that will allow them to unlock a “secret” spot (not airing during the game) on their cell phone or via a microsite. They will also be able to send customized messages to friends inviting them to view the spot.

The brewery is also planning to launch its first Web entertainment channel, Bud TV, the day after the game, where all of the game spots will be featured. “Last year, when we put our commercials on various Web sites, we were quite overwhelmed with the views we had and downloads of the commercials,” says Tony Ponturo, vp, global media and sports marketing, A-B. “That also allowed us to realize our commercials were entertainment and content.”

GoDaddy’s CEO Bob Parsons has been stoking interest in its game spot by blogging about the trouble the company has had getting its ads through CBS clearance and posting at least one of the rejected spots on his site, bobparsons.com. In it, two office workers battle over buying each other’s domain and loved ones’ names using GoDaddy.com. The phrase, “Too late, I already did my mother,” is used as a double entendre.

The overall concept of the final ad will focus on a fictional department at the online company.

The NFL, Frito-Lays’ Doritos and General Motors’ Chevrolet were some of the earliest promoters of their Super Bowl investments. Last fall, they launched contests inviting the public to create spots, making this the first Super Bowl that will air consumer-generated ad ideas. All three are keeping the public updated on the progress of the contests via dedicated pages on their sites. The NFL posted the winning pitch from New England native Gino Bona.

Chevy is running behind-the-scenes footage chronicling the Chevy Super Bowl College Ad Challenge and has posted the CG ads on its site for viewers to vote on. However, like the NFL, it is using professionals to finesse the contest winners’ concepts for the actual game spot. Only Doritos will be airing an ad entirely created by a consumer.

For the last few months, consumers have been able to watch a play-by-play of the online competition on the Doritos site, including voting on which of the over 1,000 entries they want to see aired. The five finalists are all being flown to the game and won’t know whose spot won until it airs. “There have been plenty of funny and memorable Super Bowl ads over the years, but very few have genuinely engaged consumers,” says Dan Belmont, CMO of The Marketing Arm, which is working with Goodby, Silverstein + Partners on the contest. “That’s why this year’s Doritos Super Bowl ad really breaks new ground, with thousands of consumers actively creating Doritos brand messaging.”

Despite advertisers attempts to create new approaches that will set them apart in viewers’ minds, celebrity and scandal still capture consumer attention best. Last week, Nationwide Mutual Insurance, which is prepping a Super Bowl commercial starring ex-Britney Spears husband Kevin Federline, posted outtakes from the production on YouTube. At press time, the video ha more than 100,000 views.

Steven Schreibman, Nationwide’s CMO, estimates the company has already received $5 million worth of PR and 180 million impressions from news about its ad, which is scheduled to first air on ABC’s Good Morning America on Jan. 29. He says he did not intend to disclose the content of them commercial, but word began to leak about K-Fed’s role.

According to Nielsen BuzzMetrics, Nationwide is topping the pre-game buzz, dominating Web chatter with 26 percent of all blog conversations last week. Doritos, Chevy, Bud, the NFL and an anonymous guy named J.P.—who is going to propose to his girlfriend during the game and apparently got an as-yet-unnamed advertiser to foot the bill—are also getting lots of buzz.

Pete Blackshaw, BuzzMetrics CMO, predicts the most successful advertisers will be those who extend their game-day exposure to video-sharing sites like YouTube, calling this “the torture test of marketing integration.”

Others predict it will also be the ultimate test of the CG ad trend. “This year might be the year that tells us if the users have the stuff,” says Steve Simpson, partner and cd at Goodby, which is overseeing the creative on the Emerald Nuts and HP efforts. “I’m open to it,” he adds, “but this is the year that we’ll see if it will live up to Time magazine’s hype.”

via adweek.com

Gary Detman     NEW YORK (AP) — There’s one place where you can find both FedEx, the overnight package delivery service, and “Fed-Ex,” or Kevin Federline, the future ex-husband of pop diva Britney Spears. Both will be making appearances in Super Bowl ads, the highest-profile advertising event of the year.

FedEx Corp. is keeping mum about what its ad will look like, keeping up a tradition of ultra-secrecy that many marketers follow in hopes of building up the maximum amount of surprise during the game, which airs Feb. 4 on CBS Corp.’s CBS network. Advertisers want to get the most out of the huge cost of an ad in the big game, which is running as high as $2.6 million this year, up slightly from $2.5 million last year.

Federline will be poking fun at himself in a humorous spot for the Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. under its “Life Comes At You Fast” campaign. Those spots, which have previously featured the supermodel Fabio and MC Hammer, will show Federline winding up working in a fast-food restaurant.

Humor and attempts to drive viewers to the Web, two themes from past years, are back again with some variations, and this year’s Super Bowl commercials add a new twist — viewer participation.

One of the biggest new themes of this year’s game is getting amateurs into the act. General Motors Corp.’s Chevrolet division ran a contest for college students to propose an ad that would be made by a team of professionals, and PepsiCo Inc.’s Frito-Lay unit will run an ad made entirely by an amateur contestant.

Meanwhile, Bayer Corp.’s Alka-Seltzer has a spot in the pre-game broadcast featuring the winner of a contest to come up with an updated version of its “plop-plop, fizz-fizz” jingle. The winner was Josh Anderson, a DJ at a radio station in Greensboro, N.C. The NFL also made an ad from an idea generated by a fan contest.

Many of the other spots made available for preview ahead of the big game show a decided shift to lighthearted, sometimes campy humor. That’s in contrast with a number of ads last year that highlighted oddball violence, such as a female player in a touch football game getting clobbered with an illegal tackle.

Several marketers are trying even harder to use their ads to drive traffic to Web sites associated with their brands, such as Chevrolet’s college-student contest and Nationwide, which posted outtakes from its Federline ad on its Web site.

Jo Ann Ross, the head of ad sales at CBS, says the spots have been selling well, and that several advertisers have inquired about making a tie-in with Black History Month in February given that the coaches of both teams, for the first time, are black. “That is a very, very positive story,” Ross said.

Ross said demand had been brisk for the ads, and the network was seeing strong interest following a highly rated AFC championship game and the recent announcement of nominations for the Academy Awards. “We’re wrapping it up,” she said.

It’s been a busy few weeks for Ross and her staff, including a personal trip to Omaha, Neb. to seal a deal with infoUSA Inc., a marketing database company that is one of the first-time advertisers in this year’s game.

Vin Gupta, the founder and CEO of infoUSA, said the Super Bowl represented a key chance to reach the 20 million sales people and 10 million small business owners that his company markets its services to. An excerpt of the ad provided by the company shows a successful salesman emerging from a snazzy new red sports car.

“If you’re trying to reach 30 million potential clients, the Super Bowl is the best way to reach them,” Gupta said. “Plus, it gives you instant credibility.”

Garmin International Inc., another first-timer, is planning a campy spot inspired by 1960s Japanese monster movies with a showdown between an evil “Maposaurus” and a hero who uses a Garmin-made electronic navigation device to save the day. This being the Internet age, there is, naturally, an accompanying blog: http://garmin.blogs.com.

Among returning advertisers, Diamond Foods Inc.’s Emerald Nuts brand came up with new ads after innovative spots last year that turned the company’s name into an acrostic-like word puzzle.

Emerald is hoping to generate even more interest in its ad, which features the actor Robert Goulet, by posting video clips on the video-sharing site YouTube. They feature humorous “victim testimonials” from people who didn’t have Emerald Nuts handy at that key time late in the day when many people run low on energy.

Other big advertisers are also returning, including Anheuser-Busch Cos.’ Budweiser and Bud Light brands, which are once again the game’s biggest advertisers. Featured spots will include comedian Carlos Mencia and rapper Jay-Z. YUM Brands Inc.’s Pizza Hut is coming back with another spot featuring singer Jessica Simpson, and Mars Inc. will have a spot for its Snickers bar set in an auto garage.

Coca-Cola Co. is back in the game with three spots, having had a spot in the pre-game last year for an energy drink. Two of the spots have already aired, and the company is keeping the third one secret, a spokeswoman said.

Job-search business CareerBuilder, meanwhile, has ditched its office monkey theme in favor of a gladiatorial contest among office workers who find themselves in a jungle setting fighting for a promotion in front of a jury box of boss figures. CareerBuilder is jointly owned by the newspaper publishers Gannett Co., McClatchy Co. and Tribune Co.

via firstcoastnews.com

via marketwatch.com

By William Spain, MarketWatch

CHICAGO (MarketWatch) — America hasn’t even seen his company’s commercial running on the Super Bowl yet, and Steven Schreibman is already happy with the returns from Nationwide Mutual Insurance’s purchase of the most expensive TV advertising time in history.

His ad stars Kevin Federline, Britney Spears’s estranged husband, fantasizing about doing a music video while cooking up fries at a fast-food restaurant. The spot has generated publicity and buzz beyond a marketer’s wildest dreams, said Schreibman, Nationwide’s vice president of advertising and brand management.

As of Thursday afternoon, the ad had generated hundreds of stories in the media, leading to 137 million Web viewings — or the number of times people see a brand, he said. “Right now, we are at about $5 million in ad value and there is more than a week to go before the game.”

Already one of the most talked-about ads so far, Nationwide’s campaign got an extra shot in the arm this week when the head of the National Restaurant Association attacked it as demeaning to the industry’s workers and threatened to make his group’s “membership — many of whom are customers of Nationwide — know the negative implications this ad portrays of the restaurant industry.”

Sure, he’s been put on the defensive, but the ad’s a success nonetheless: The response to it did “drum up another week of coverage for us,” Schreibman said.

While Nationwide has managed to reap a standout bonanza, a big payoff in press and word of mouth is what marketers have come to expect — even demand — when they’re shelling out upwards of $80,000 a second for TV time on the Super Bowl, carried this year by CBS Sports.

Officially, CBS is asking sponsors to pay about $2.6 million for a 30-second spot in the Feb. 4 game. However, few, if any, companies actually pay the full rate, according to industry executives.

What advertisers really crave is eyeballs — millions and millions of them. And when it comes to delivering them all at once and in real-time, the Super Bowl has no equal, especially as TV viewership divides and sub-divides among the hundreds of channels now available on cable and satellite.

“It’s fragmentation-proof, or least fragmentation-resistant,” said Jason Maltby, president of national broadcast for MindShare, a media-buying firm owned by WPP Group. “You are reaching almost 1 out of every 2 Americans. Nothing else in any media even comes close.”

In addition, “there is a much higher level of attention and engagement with the commercials,” he added.

Among those lining up for this years’ Super Bowl are longtime stalwarts like Anheuser-Busch Cos. (with nine spots, the largest single advertiser), PepsiCo and Fedex Corp. They will be joined by rookies including Garmin, which makes global-positioning systems, and King Pharmaceuticals Inc. Some advertisers, such as PepsiCo’s Doritos brand and the NFL itself, are even letting viewers create their own ads this time.

‘Meaningful viewership’

There are almost as many different goals and different measures of success for Super Bowl ad as there are advertisers buying time. Some aren’t expecting to see any immediate results and are just building or maintaining awareness of their brands. Others look to drive traffic to their Web sites. And still others want to see an immediate move in the sales needle.

“If you are lucky, your one spot out of 60-something is projected onto the national stage and has people talking about it,” said Peter Stabler, director of communications strategy for Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, a San Francisco-based ad agency owned by Omnicom Group. “You get an outsized awareness beyond [the] aggregated ratings points.”

This year, that awareness could be larger than ever. Minutes after the conclusion of the game, Google will have a link on its home page to a YouTube.com site featuring every single commercial that aired during the Super Bowl — and Stabler expects millions of hits from that.

“For the first time, you are going to have really meaningful viewership of the spots once they have been disconnected from the game,” Stabler said.

Super Bowl ads can also help haul in huge, immediate bottom-line contributions, marketers say. One of Goodby’s clients, Diamond Foods, will be in the game for the third year running. The cost of admission and all the support behind it is a big investment for a company that had less than $500 million in sales in its latest fiscal year. Diamond’s Emerald Nuts, launched in 2004, bought Super Bowl ads in both 2005 and 2006, a strategy it directly credits for boosting sales 56% and 36%, respectively and lifting them into the No. 2 seller in the category behind Kraft Foods’ 100-year-old Planter’s brand.

“They’ve been very happy,” Stabler said. “It has been a very powerful tool for them to leverage their retail partnerships.”

Then there is always simple self-defense. For instance, Coca-Cola will return to the Super Bowl this year after a long absence during which it essentially ceded the field to archrival PepsiCo.

The move, coinciding with Coke’s stagnant soft-drink sales and turmoil in its marketing division, won applause from at least one to beverage industry consultant.

“I thought it was one of the biggest bone-headed moves of all time for Coke to let Pepsi dominate the Super Bowl,” said Tom Pirko, head of consultancy Bevmark. “You cannot allow your ace competitor to have undivided attention in the biggest public spectacle in the country.”

Ads by Joe Six-Pack

In most sporting events, TV commercials aim their message at men. But in addition to its sheer mass audience, the Super Bowl also offers marketers exposure to an extraordinary range of consumers.

“The reach is enormous and you get every demographic,” said Bill Cella, vice chairman of Interpublic’s DraftFCB ad agency. “And it goes on all day, with huge [group] audiences.”

Indeed, the group dynamic can make all the difference, he said, as a lone couch potato tends to be a passive viewer than when he or she is surrounded by friends and family.

“They talk about the ads more. I think they are more engaged,” Cella said.

Some viewers will be remarkably well engaged — some of then actually created a few of the ads this year. General Motors, Frito-Lay and the NFL itself all reached out to the public for ideas and cherry-picked the very best to air in the game.

“That’s this year’s flavor,” remarked MindShare’s Maltby. “It’s definitely a hot-button issue and they are trying to leverage this fascination with user-generated content.”

But is it the wave of the future? Will amateurs knock high-powered ad agency creative teams out of their biggest showcase of the year?

“Let’s just see how it resonates,” Maltby said.

via marketwatch.com

‘Microsites,’ online extras add value for marketers paying millions

By Martin Wolk - Chief economics correspondent

The Super Bowl is television’s biggest event by far, with nearly 90 million Americans expected to tune in to ABC Feb. 5 for the big game and its much-hyped commercials, selling this year for a record $2.5 million per 30 seconds.

But the championship game also has become a huge event on the Internet, with some Web sites enjoying traffic spikes of 500, 1,000 or even 2,000 percent.

For many advertisers, a Super Bowl commercial is not complete without a dedicated Web site, or “microsite,” offering extras like contests, free downloads and extended versions of their television ads.

In a new twist this year several advertisers, including Burger King and Degree deodorant, are offering versions of their commercials that can be downloaded for viewing on an iPod. Several marketers say they are buying up Internet search keywords to make sure viewers can easily track down the commercials after the game.

CareerBuilder.com, which will appear in its second Super Bowl this year with another set of ads featuring simian office workers, will steer viewers to a specially designed site offering the chance to send a “monk-e-mail,” a customized electronic greeting card featuring a monkey speaking with the sender’s voice.

“It is a little juvenile, but it is a fun way of engaging in the brand,” said Richard Castellini, vice president of consumer marketing for CareerBuilder.

Such microsites, which often feature viral marketing hooks like e-cards, have been around for several years and allow companies to reach specific target groups with messaging that might not be suitable in the confines of a broader corporate site. A classic example was Burger King’s “subservient chicken” site, launched in connection with a 2004 menu promotion but not heavily publicized.

“It really was something we wanted consumers to stumble on,” said Adrienne Hayes, a Burger King spokesman.

This year Burger King, returning to the Super Bowl for the first time in 11 years, is launching whopperettes.com, a microsite based on the showgirl theme of its 60-second game ad. In addition to video downloads the site will feature behind-the-scenes footage, telephone ring tones, sheet music and an “irreverent” build-your-own Whopper feature, said Gillian Smith, Burger King’s senior director of media and interactive.

Exclusive video extras will be available during the game to subscribers of Sprint’s wireless video phone service.

“We want to make sure we have a 360-degree approach to reach our target audience at every touch point,” said Smith. “We know the Super Bowl ads are the most talked-about ads of the year, and to provide people who are watching with some exclusive content, something interesting and unique, we think is just a great way to help us as a brand.”

“The experience of people online is that you can convey the information more quickly, easily and deeply than you can in other mediums,” said Castellini of CareerBuilder. “Not to say the 30-second spot is going to go away in its entirety — it’s just going to be augmented by other forms of marketing.”

Last year the help-wanted Web site had record traffic on Super Bowl Sunday and the days immediately following, including a 50 percent boost in unique users, an impressive number for a site that averages 20 million visitors a month.

Other sites that saw big increases stemming from Super Bowl advertising last year included Budweiser.com, up 600 percent, and Apple’s iTunes, which benefited from a Pepsi promotion offering a chance to win free music downloads.

Another big winner was GoDaddy.com, a relatively unknown Internet company that generated controversy last year with its ad featuring a buxom actress losing her blouse. The Web site, which offered an extended version of the television commercial, got 850,000 unique visitors on Super Bowl Monday last year, according to Nielsen/NetRatings.

“The volume of traffic to advertisers’ Web sites really spikes before, during and after the game,” said Peter Hershberg, managing partner of Reprise Media, which specializes in helping companies market themselves by Internet keyword search. “There is no question the Internet is becoming increasingly important both as it relates to Super Bowl advertising and as it relates to advertising in general.”

In fact, the unique nature of the Super Bowl as a showcase for the most creative advertising of the year drives traffic to dozens of Web sites after the game — including this one — as viewers seek out specific ads to view them again and vote on their favorites.

After a rerun of GoDaddy’s ad was yanked at the request of the National Football League last year, the company is negotiating with ABC officials over whether it can sufficiently tame its creative content for this year’s matchup between the Seattle Seahawks and Pittsburgh Steelers. Company president Bob Parsons is doing his best to keep the controversy stoked with a blog detailing his efforts and a Web site featuring an extended version of the latest television commercial featuring the provocative pitchwoman, Candice Michelle.

Emerald Nuts, a relatively new brand that has put a lot of effort into designing an entertaining Web site, used a bit of guerrilla marketing in its maiden Super Bowl campaign last year. Viewers who went to the Emerald Nuts site were warned NOT to go to AngryLeprechaun.com, a site purportedly set up by an actor upset about being dropped from the Super Bowl commercial.

The AngryLeprechaun site, of course, was just an extension of the company’s marketing, offering viewers yet another opportunity to view the snack maker’s commercials and sign up for e-mailed newsletters.

Tim Cannon, director of marketing for Emerald’s parent Diamond Foods, said traffic to the company’s Web site went up twentyfold in the days after the Super Bowl.

“If you think about it, you have 30 seconds to interact with a consumer in a television commercial. We’re in a brand-building mode right now, and it’s difficult to say a lot about our product” in 30 seconds.

This year the company is returning for its second Super Bowl and has made “a major effort” to integrate the planned television spot with a 10-day newspaper advertising blitz and a contest on the Web site, Cannon said. The contest, based on the theme of the company’s ad campaign, challenges people to come up with their own humorous scenarios out of an acrostic based on the Emerald Nuts name. (One television ad features “engrossed manicurists,” while another offers “exercising matadors.”)

Aleve, advertising for the first time in the Super Bowl, also has created a special Web site tied to its ad campaign offering users a chance to share any “good news,” especially if it relates to a certain non-prescription medication that eased their pain. In the run-up to the Super Bowl Aleve partnered with ESPN.com on a football-themed sweepstakes featuring a chance to win a big-screen television.

Jay Kolpon, vice president of marketing and new business development for Bayer, which makes Aleve, said the Web site is an important part of the product’s “communications platform” but no substitute for a Super Bowl TV spot, which he called a bargain at $5 million a minute.

While the Web site allows for deep engagement with customers, television — especially the Super Bowl — offers a mass audience impossible to find elsewhere, Kolpon said.

“There is no other way in America I can reach 90 million viewers in one fell swoop,” he said “There is power in the mass that that brings.”

Nationwide, a first-time Super Bowl advertiser, also plans to launch a microsite with its new brand-image campaign, allowing users to post messages on an electronic text “crawl” in New York’s Times Square and view it over a Webcam. The Web site will not be ready in time for the Super Bowl, but that does not seem to bother advertising vice president Steven Schreibman.

“The game is just one element” of a major national branding campaign that will continue in the months ahead, he said. There will be more television advertising, direct mail, Internet advertising and local advertising.

“It’s not like we’re doing a promotion like Frito-Lay, where everything has to line up,” he said.

Unilever, which will be back for its second Super Bowl with ads for Degree and Dove, discovered last year that the Internet provides instant feedback on the creative content of the advertising, said Kevin George, director of marketing for the company’s deodorant lines.

“We don’t know any more about the people, but we know how long they stay and whether they forwarded the ad to their friends,” he said.

He predicted this year’s ad, featuring a day in the life of a city where all the residents are stunt men, will also drive heavy traffic to the Web among viewers who want to see more than they can glimpse in fast-moving 30-second ad.

“The 60-second director’s cut has more guys on fire – it’s really well done,” George said.

via http://www.msnbc.msn

By Karen Robinson-Jacobs, The Dallas Morning News

For only the third time since 1993, snack king Frito-Lay Inc. will not be among the companies paying millions for Super Bowl ad time, the company’s chief executive said Wednesday.

Irene Rosenfeld told The Dallas Morning News that the company plans to focus its marketing might at the first of the year on new products such as Cheddar and Sour Cream Baked Lay’s potato chips.

But consumers should not expect to see those spots in the much-hyped gridiron showdown, where a 30-second spot is expected to cost $2.4 million, according to published reports.

“You’ll probably see some interesting things, not from us,” said Ms. Rosenfeld, who took over last year as head of the Plano-based snack maker, which is part of PepsiCo Inc.

“I have a little calendar page that says: ‘Lay’s runs Super Bowl ad. Awareness increases by .000004.’ So although it gives you enormous bragging rights, the facts are, at the end of the day, it’s a very expensive proposition that doesn’t give you a terrific payback.

“We’ve chosen to spend our money elsewhere this year.”

Spokesman Charles Nicolas said there was an “off chance” the company could switch gears at the last minute and field a player.

If Frito-Lay does take a pass, it won’t be alone.

Mediaweek, a trade publication, reported that Visa and McDonald’s also will opt out of Super Bowl XL, which is set to air Feb. 5 on ABC. Those firms, and others, may switch their ad dollars to February’s Winter Olympics, Mediaweek said.

But PepsiCo, based in Purchase, N.Y., will get airtime at the big game. The company is producing several new commercials but hasn’t decided how many, or which ones, will air, said a spokesman.

via redorbit.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/07/business/media/07adcol.html

By STUART ELLIOTT

Published: February 7, 2005

It may be hard to say, and harder to believe, but Madison Avenue could owe Janet Jackson a big thank-you.

The commercials that were broadcast on Fox last night during Super Bowl XXXIX were, in general, markedly better than typical spots from the last few Super Bowls – though there were some stinkers. And the reason for that improvement could well be Ms. Jackson’s breast-baring during the halftime show last year.

The reaction against the notorious “wardrobe malfunction” also generated attacks against crass, boorish commercials that ran before and after Ms. Jackson’s performance. Those spots relied on crude humor to pander to a large segment of the Super Bowl audience: younger men who live to laugh at bathroom jokes and misogynistic jibes.

Chastened by the complaints, advertisers and agencies promised to clean up their acts and proceed cautiously with commercials for 2005. That pledge was widely interpreted as foreshadowing a dull, play-it-safe Ad Bowl inside the Super Bowl.

But many of the 30 sponsors of the game rose to the occasion, proving they could deliver attention-getting ads without stooping to the fraternity-house antics of last year, featuring disreputable characters like a flatulent horse, a crotch-biting dog and a monkey pitching woo to a woman.

For instance, FedEx turned its Super Bowl marketing playbook back to 1998, when it won plaudits for a witty commercial by BBDO Worldwide in New York, part of the Omnicom Group, that mocked the conventions of Super Bowl commercials.

The 2005 version, also from BBDO New York, crammed into 30 seconds the 10 ingredients purportedly guaranteed to insure Super Sunday success. They included an obligatory celebrity (the actor Burt Reynolds), a bear (the required dancing, talking animal), two lissome cheerleaders (representing attractive females) and, when the bear became a film critic, one of those surprise endings so beloved by copywriters of Super Bowl spots.

The best moment: When Mr. Reynolds paused to deliver a pitch for FedEx, it was identified on screen as Item No. 8, “Product message (optional).”

Fox charged an estimated average of $2.4 million for each 30 seconds of commercial time, and some advertisers, alas, could not resist reflexively reaching for the lowest common denominator. For example, CareerBuilder.com, a job Web site owned by three newspaper companies, ran three commercials by Cramer-Krasselt in Chicago featuring a cast of – yawn – mischievous monkeys dressed as office workers.

Those viewers who still longed for the callow carryings-on of last year were rewarded with formulaic sight gags involving whoopee cushions, bananas and a literal interpretation of the phrase “kissing up to the boss.”

What follows is an assessment of some of the best and worst other commercials. The spots described below are among 35 provided to reporters before the game, out of the total of 50 commercials that were scheduled to run.

Anheuser-Busch A gauzy valentine to American troops, which ended with the Anheuser-Busch corporate logo superimposed on screen, was touching, but some viewers may have wondered whether “Busch” had been misspelled. And a commercial for designating a driver managed to deliver its message with a wink rather than a lecture. Agency: the Chicago office of DDB Worldwide, part of Omnicom.

Bubblicious A spot for Bubblicious gum, sold by the Cadbury Adams division of Cadbury Schweppes, was short (15 seconds) but sweet. The commercial, for the new LeBron’s Lightning Lemonade flavor endorsed by LeBron James, showed that having your bubble burst is not always a bad thing. Agency: JWT in New York, part of the WPP Group.

Budweiser The playful horses in a commercial for Budweiser beer, sold by Anheuser-Busch, were far better behaved than their gassy counterpart in a Bud Light spot last year. A stable of Clydesdales faced off in a snowball fight, and the cute “razzberry” in the finale was as naughty as they got. Agency: DDB Chicago.

Degree A commercial for a new line of Degree deodorants sold by Unilever took a risk by pretending to celebrate men who avoid risk, as embodied by a make-believe brand of “Inaction Heroes” dolls bearing names like Mama’s Boy. The spot succeeded where so many failed last year, by treading the fine line between boldness and tastelessness. Agency: Lowe & Partners in New York, part of the Interpublic Group of Companies.

Lay’s Come back, MC Hammer, all is forgiven. That seemed to be the message delivered by a commercial featuring the 1980′s rapper, for the Lay’s potato chip brand sold by the Frito-Lay division of PepsiCo. As for the connection between salty snacks and silly singers, as Mr. Hammer might put it, “U Can’t Figure This Out.” Agency: Spike DDB in New York, owned by the director Spike Lee and DDB Worldwide.

McDonald’s The fast-food company McDonald’s surprised with a hilarious commercial, far more clever than its usual fare. The spot, presented in a deadpan “mockumentary” style reminiscent of “This Is Spinal Tap,” was centered on a French fry that allegedly resembled Abraham Lincoln, which improbably became the subject of a bidding war on the Yahoo Shopping Web site. Agency: DDB Chicago.

MasterCard Cynics laughed last fall when Advertising Week in New York City began with a parade of familiar advertising characters. But the idea now seems, well, priceless, thanks to a delightful dinner reunion of 10 brand icons like the Jolly Green Giant, Mr. Peanut and the Morton Salt girl, sponsored by Debit MasterCard from MasterCard International. One disturbing thought: What was in that casserole Charlie the Tuna ate so heartily? Agency: McCann Erickson in New York, part of the McCann Worldgroup division of Interpublic (which created a MasterCard character for the occasion).

Pepsi-Cola A prosaic idea to promote iTunes and Pepsi-Cola, sponsored by Apple Computer and PepsiCo, turned up not once but twice: Uncap a Pepsi bottle and hear music; recap the bottle and the music stops. What, viewers didn’t get it the first time? But it was worth the double play to hear Gwen Stefani and Eve sing “If I Were a Rich Girl,” based on the song from “Fiddler on the Roof.” What’s not to like? Agency: the Playa del Rey, Calif., office of TBWA/Chiat/Day, part of the TBWA Worldwide division of Omnicom.

Silestone Jocks almost always play stock characters in commercials, taking parts like thug, superstar or dim bulb, but a droll spot for the Silestone brand of quartz surfaces sold by Cosentino defied convention. “I am Diana Pearl,” former athletes like Mike Ditka and Dennis Rodman declared, “Spartacus”-style. Huh? The punch line: It’s a color of Silestone they like. Agency: Freed Advertising in Sugar Land, Tex.

Subway A slyly subversive commercial for a new line of Fresh Toasted Subs sold by the Subway chain, owned by Doctor’s Associates, managed a feat that eluded so many spots last year: pulling off a sight gag without being obnoxious or offensive. It seemed to show an amorous couple parked for a hot makeout session, but as a pair of inquiring police officers learned, appearances can deceive when guys get hungry. Agency: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners in San Francisco, part of Omnicom.

http://www.timesleader.com/mld/timesleader/10830348.htm

Commercials costing $2.4 million for a 30-second slot is an easy sale for today’s Super Bowl.

By Karen Robinson-Jacobs The Dallas Morning News

DALLAS, Texas, — Thirty seconds of glory during today’s Super Bowl telecast is running advertisers an average of $2.4 million.

That’s the equivalent of 800,000 bags of Classic Lay’s potato chips or 1.3 million bottles of caffeine-free Pepsi.

But there’s no shortage of advertisers willing to pony up for air time, including snack food maker Frito-Lay Inc. and its corporate parent, PepsiCo Inc.

The $2.4 million price tag — widely reported within industry circles, though not confirmed by broadcaster Fox Sports — is more than double the $1 million-per-spot figure of just 10 years ago. Last year’s ads averaged $2.25 million.

Advertisers accept the price inflation because “Super Sunday” represents their best chance to reach a mass audience, given the growing sea of cable TV options and the challenges presented by TiVo, marketing experts say. The game is expected to draw at least 90 million TV viewers.

“The Super Bowl by far provides the largest audience an advertiser can reach at one time,” said Nicole Bradley, a spokeswoman for Pepsi-Cola North America, a unit of PepsiCo. “No other advertising vehicle can do that. And people are paying attention to the ads almost as much as the game.”

The next-biggest annual draw is the Academy Awards, with about 40 million viewers and an average cost this year of just over $1.6 million for 30 seconds, up from $1.5 million in 2004.

Few advertisers can play in the Super Bowl’s league. For the elite, the rationale doesn’t always include an immediate sales boost, experts say. Some are seeking greater brand recognition; others want the cachet of being associated with some of sports’ finest. And for makers of widely used products such as snacks and soft drinks, advertising during the game is a natural, experts added.

PepsiCo has advertised during the game for 19 years, Frito-Lay for 11. PepsiCo bought five spots this time, reportedly making it the second-biggest Super Bowl ad spender behind Anheuser-Busch Cos. Advertising insiders say most of Fox’s 59 available ad slots are sold.

Bradley would not say how much PepsiCo paid for the spots, or which ads will air. Media reports put the price at about $12 million and list one ad as a promo for the fast-growing Diet Pepsi line.

Separately, Frito-Lay bought one spot, with plans to pitch its Classic Lay’s brand.

In “Fence,” a 30-second spot directed by Spike Lee, children marvel at a neighbor’s return of several items that have been missing for years — including a 1972 Chevy Impala and rapper MC Hammer.

Frito-Lay declined to say how much the ad cost to produce, but Dan Howard, chairman of the department of marketing at Southern Methodist University’s Cox School of Business, said spots featuring well-known celebrities can run more than $1 million. That’s on top of the ad buy.

Even so, the hefty outlay can be money well-spent, depending on product and the seller, said Chuck Tomkovick, a University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire marketing professor.

The Super Bowl has turned into its own “selling season,” which starts at least 10 days before kickoff. The main items purchased are food, drinks and, to a lesser extent, electronics.

Hallmark Cards Inc. lists the Super Bowl as the nation’s second-biggest party day, behind only New Year’s Eve.

“You’re in a consumption mode for three to six hours. And what you’re seeing on television is what you’re eating. That reinforces that you made the right decision,” Tomkovick said.

Pizza Hut Inc., whose ads run up to kickoff, expects to sell 2 million pizzas that day.

Advertisers also benefit from the ever-increasing ad buzz — including everything from heavy media coverage to Web sites such as SuperBowl-Ads.com and countless blogs.

“For food and beverage companies, those are very wise investments,” assuming the ads are well-done, Tomkovick said.

SMU’s Howard concedes that the “absolute cost eliminates most companies on the face of the Earth.” But at a scant 3 cents per viewer, “the cost is not so bad,” he said.

Tomkovick sees nothing on the horizon to stop the ads from creeping up to $3 million within this decade.

Howard believes the sky’s the limit. “It will go as high as the bidding goes,” he said.