Sprite has continued its love affair with the NBA during the playoffs. Watching any one of the NBA games this weekend you would have seen this Sprite commercial dubbed “Slam”.
The strategy is the same as usual. Sprite is refreshing and quenches your thirst. The way the commercial conveys that main idea disappoints me. Having people in the spot jump into each other and combust into a spray of Sprite doesn’t make sense to me. It doesn’t convey a sense of refreshment and enjoyment to me. Why do they have to jump into each other to receive the benefit of the drink? Is the drink painful at first, then the refreshment washes over you?
On the other hand the Sprite commercial below does a very good job of conveying the main idea. Again, Sprite is saying their product is refreshing and will quench your thirst. To do that they have the people in the commercial jump into a basketball court that morphs into a pool. This makes me feel like Sprite is refreshing. I can picture myself standing on that blistering hot basketball court, taking a sip of a cold Sprite and being transported into a refreshing, cool, pool. We all have memories of being at the beach or a pool on a hot summer day, and how nice and refreshing it felt to jump into the water. This spot does exactly that.
What do you think about these spots? Do you think they both convey Sprite’s main idea well?
-The Ultimate Account Guy
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To me, the first spot is their attempt to grab market share from Mt. Dew by capitalizing on an idea that already worked for them once (the water/matter idea from the second spot). But instead of a head to head challenge on the court, board or what have you, they physically run into each other, simply a metaphor for the challenge. The explosion represents the energy they get from Sprite, and having it spray all over everyone is the carryover enjoyment they get from watching two athletes at the top of their game derived from the Sprite.
ReplyDeleteOr, you could argue Achems razor, and declare that the agency thought that having people explode into Sprite would just look really, really cool. As it does. And that people would find it entertaining, which I do. Sometimes in advertising, we do things that have no real purpose. But, when you are dealing with such an established brand, sometimes you just get to make cool ads that increase brand awareness. You know that Sprite is a drink, and that it's one of the clear sodas, and that its a 'refreshing blend of lemon and lime.' So, they get to move on to the fun stuff.
Think skittles and the bizarre turn their ads have taken lately.
Kelli,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the feedback. Maybe I'm thinking to linear (being an account guy an all). The first spot has a linear flow to it. You drink Sprite, feel refreshed like you're swimming in a pool hence the basketball court turning into a pool. The other spot doesn't flow that way and I think that's where my difficulty with it comes in. As always, its great to see another person's perspective.
i agree that the commercial makes absolutely no sense. they could have found a better way to use a decent effect. running into each other to a nu-metal soundtrack just boggles my mind.
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