Thursday, May 28, 2009

Old School Thursday – Fritos

For this week’s Old School Thursday I found a dandy of a commercial from Fritos in 1978. This commercial has its strengths and of course one big draw back, but stands up pretty well to the test of time. It has a clear, simple message that conveys both a rational and emotional benefit of the product. It also has the classic jingle that was all the rage during this time.



The core of this commercial would hold up even now because it shows the product solving a problem. The problem is lunch is boring, so they start the commercial with a boy playing in his soup instead of enjoying his lunch. Fritos are introduced and all of a sudden lunch is fun. The “good corn taste” is a godsend for a mother with a son that just doesn’t want to eat his lunch. The rational portion of the mother is happy because her son is eating lunch and getting the energy he needs. The emotional portion of the mother is also happy because her son has perked up and is actually enjoying his lunch.

The main draw back to this commercial is the jingle. The jingle doesn’t add anything to the commercial. It is basically used to take up space where the boy or an off camera mother figure would be speaking. All of the rational benefits of Fritos are delivered by the voice over. You could just as easily remove the jingle, add in a couple lines of copy for the boy and run this spot today. You can’t blame them for using a jingle though, jingles dominated advertising at the time. Today the only jingles that work are ones that are used satirically and in small doses.

Overall this is a quality commercial that I think stands up through time. The rational and emotional benefits are still relevant today. The only changes needed to make it a modern commercial would be to remove the jingle and add a line about Fritos only having three ingredients to capture a sliver of health factor.

What do you think about this commercial? Does it stand up to the test of time?

-Dennis

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