The top 10 ad campaigns of the last 15 years
Consider that topic for a second – The top 10 ad campaigns of the last 15 years. Everyone will have a different concept of what is “good”. After all, there’s some people out there whose idea of good might be watching ‘Selling Sunset’ or listening to ‘All-Time Best UK Garage Hits’.
While opinions, measurables and levels of quality may differ, it’s a difficult skill to produce an advert or campaign that connects and engages with a broad audience, across different cultures and sections of the world.
Brands and organisations invest a huge amount of effort, time and money in order to find that perfect message for their products. Added to that came different pressure in the face of changing social attitudes as well as consumer choices and behaviour. Brands have had to adapt to a range of issues as well in the past decade:
Digital and Mobile-First Technology
Rise of Social Advertising and Influencer Marketing
Sustainable, Ethical and Socially Conscious Behaviour
Online Shopping
Covid-19 and Shift to Working from Home
Factors such as this meant ad agencies had to pull out their most creative campaigns and stop treating everything like it was running on an enlarged or moving version of a print campaign.
This produced a panoply of campaigns that simultaneously inspired, connected, provoked and highlighted the conversation around the brands that were appearing and the topics interwoven within a campaign's narrative as well as the subsequent issues that were born out of these.
Some were funny, some were powerful, tapping into legacy themes in a new way and alluding to wider and deeper issues that had seldom appeared or been dealt with in an advertising universe, and because of this, were made even more potent because of it.
Moneysupermarket.com - “Epic Strut” 2015
It almost begins like any other homogenous insurance ad, on a homogenous day and as pale, male and stale as you could get. Even the lead character is called ‘Dave’. For the first two seconds as his car pulls up, everything about this ad is conventional. The only hint of the exotic is that it's taking place in Los Angeles. Then as Dave exits his car, there’s a certain sass in his walk, and glint in his eye.
Then, the beat of ‘Don’t Cha’ by The Pussycat Dolls kicks in, and the camera pans away to give us a full shot of Dave, wearing high heels and the tightest of tight shorts, which receives A LOT of attention throughout the ad. Pedestrians transform from bland bit-parts to integral dramatis personae and backing dancers for Dave, as he twerks and bemuses passers-by and mature dog walkers with his uncompromising sashay down the streets.
It’s capped off by Sharon Osbourne giving Dave the ultimate praise of being “so Money Supermarket” as he strides by her. As the most complained about of 2015, it definitely created a stir and hit on a rich seam for the brand, inspiring a series of sequels thereafter.
Old Spice - Man Your Man Could Smell Like - 2010
As quickfire and innovative as they come, charismatic actor Isaiah Mustafa breaks the fourth wall and addresses the partners and female audience directly, instead of directly to a male audience (one of the most fickle and hard-to-reach audiences bar teenagers). Asking them to compare their males to Isaiah’s various and ever-changing gifts, from “tickets to that thing you love” to a palm of overflowing diamonds, the rapid change of scenes and locations speed from bathroom, to yacht to the random pay off line “I’m on a horse.”
It upended the traditional male perspective and immediately cuts ties with its previous advertising forays, which were already verging on cliched when they appeared in the 1980s.
This ad though ticked every box going: humorous, engaging, unorthodox and refreshing in every sense of the word.
Friends of the Earth
When it comes to hard-hitting messages, nothing hits home harder than being forced to acknowledge a problem, especially when it’s all around you and right under your nose. Friends of the Earth employed JWT Hong Kong to create this pollution awareness campaign, which used the top of drink lids that were being used by food carts in the street. This kind of creative thinking reinforces the message that just because you can’t see it, it doesn’t mean the problem isn’t there. The city has faced constant challenges when it comes to air pollution, but this campaign was an effective and memorable concept which other cities in the world should take notice of.
Greggs - Vegan Sausage Roll - 2019
No one really expected Greggs – that stalwart of high street bakeries – to enter the market with a vegan sausage roll, but enter it they did. As bold as one of their famous bacon sandwiches, the firm partnered with Quorn (which provided the meat-free filling) and were unrepentant about being one of the savoury outlets to offer a vegan option.To bolster the accompanying furore, it released an ad that lent more than a passing reference to the commotion that surrounds an Apple iPhone.
Beginning with the rumble of an Imperial Star Destroyer’s engine and joined by some suitably ominous music, the roll rotates on its pasty axis in all its burnished glory, with all the important features highlighted for the viewer. Among these are its optimal flake resolution, 96 pastry layers, 147mm length and a user interface that, we're told, is helpfully compatible with a user’s face. It also has a handy touch operation function too, and, for the tech geeks, contains 10 Mega-Bites, too. Sales of the roll were an unexpected success, because it opened Gregg’s to a new plant-based audience, the novelty factor of the food and because of this advert.
Always - #LikeAGirl - 2015
As much as ads get better with a bit of humour, there’s something to be said for those that challenge established norms or outdated beliefs. Always’ parent company, Procter & Gamble ensured that the insult “Like A Girl” was upended, analysed, debated and reclaimed to instead have positive associations. It was a stark and illuminating advert, which took place in a casting call-esque environment, and showed the discriminatory and hurtful effects of being told to “run like a girl”, “throw like a girl” and “fight like a girl”.
Those who were more than 12 years old reverted to the typical stereotypes of showing weak and unconvincing actions. However, for the pre-teens, they were confident, unafraid and unhindered by pre-existing concepts of how they were supposed to act. A deep and affecting ad that deserved all of the awards and praise that followed its release.
Kentucky Fried Chicken - FCK - 2018
When one of the largest fast-food chains ran out of the very foodstuff that it sells, what to do? Send out contrite, corporate talking heads on daytime shows, mollifying posts and placatory press releases can only do so much. However, this very scenario unfolded for KFC, when a new delivery contract with DHL led to temporary supply issues with more than 900 of its UK restaurants. The company responded in the only way big brands can.
A big fat mea culpa of an advert was printed out in The Sun and Metro newspapers, and acted as a good example of crisis comms. With a bucket displaying “FCK”, it opened with the glaringly obvious: “A chicken restaurant without any chicken. It’s not ideal”. It went on to explain the situation, but it’s big takeaway, impishly playing on its corporate name, turned fiasco into full-on success and ensured no lasting harm was done.
Volkswagen - The Force - 2011
When all else fails, call in the Star Wars’ references and get a diminutive Darth Vader to attempt to control the environment, animals and objects by using their mind, and their mind alone. Striding imperiously down the corridor of a house in a US suburb, little Darth attempts to assert mental superiority over a very nonplussed dog, an exercise bike, baby doll, washing machine and, that toughest of all objects – a sandwich.
Cue Dad’s Passat though, which rolls up the drive and proves to be another subject for wee Darth’s pseudo-Jedi powers. Initially, it’s to no avail – mind tricks don’t work on the weak-minded, as Jabba the Hutt was only so keen to inform Luke in Return of the Jedi. However, with thrusting hands, Darth tries once more, only for the Passat to react by starting briefly, shocking the child out of his dark-side self. Cut to the dad that thinks he’s hilarious, pressing the “start” key in the kitchen while observing little Darth. A real crowd-pleaser of an ad that debuted at the 2011 Super Bowl.
Nivea - International Men’s Day
While the mere notion of an International Men’s Day attracts a certain amount of criticism (and rightly so), it did give Nivea the perfect opportunity to position itself as a force for good and highlight an issue that has dogged males (said or unsaid) for decades – that real men should stay silent. Placing spoken word artist Alika Agidi-Jeffs in an empty caff, he starts uttering his own unique brand of poetry without fanfare.
“So you worry. You give a damn. I hope you know you can. Heart on my sleeve, tears in your eyes, emotions runnin’ high, that’s brave. But being brave enough to reach out when you need help is what it’s about.
Sometimes you feel the panic. Troubles come from all angles in life and you just can’t plan it. Things can get you down, especially right now but you’re not alone, it’s important you know I’m here for you, I’m here to help guide you through. A Man. That cares.”
His delivery is affecting, direct and affecting; there’s no music, just the hum of the evening passing by, reinforcing the message without distraction so you can focus on his words. It closes with the stat that 1 in 3 men say they have often felt lonely. Suicide is widely understood to be one of the biggest killers of men. Nivea tackled the topic head on, dealing with difficult issues in a powerful and thought-provoking way.
Heinz Ketchup - No One Grows Ketchup Like - 2020
Sometimes you just have to be minimal. Enough with the intricate videos, the script edited to within an inch of its life, the actors and actresses that have to connect with the audience… often the cleverest ads just use the object that’s being advertised.
Here, the Heinz ketchup bottle is used to great effect, with its distinguishable red dominating the entire ad, bar the details at the bottom of the glass bottle, the tomato’s pedicel and sepal (green plant bit at the top) and the identifiable logo at the bottom with the line “No one grows ketchup like” just above the Heinz logo. Classic, attention grabbing and true to the brand’s very original heritage.
Lego - Create campaign - 2014
Nothing makes people stop and pay attention to an ad more than seeing the unfamiliar recreate the (almost familiar). A Lego character’s arm is outstretched to meet a child’s hand, with one finger outstretched. The lighting is simple, a hint of shadow on the hand, but the positioning ignites something else in our mind – a memory… it looks like something we’ve seen before but we can’t quite place it. Some people may have guessed it already, others will be left with the notion that it will come to them at some point, leaving the advert to linger around their mind just that bit longer.
It does in fact reference Michaelangelo’s The Creation of Adam, and is a real masterstroke, calling into mind the aspects of the whole notion of creating, and who is capable of performing it.
