Super Bowl 44

Super Bowl 44 may be remembered as an exciting game that came down to a play late in the fourth quarter before it was decided, but I am not sure the commercials will be remembered as long in my opinion. Corporations are spending $3 million for a half a minute to put their name and product in front of million of viewers. So the question that runs through my mind is what are these companies getting for the millions their spending. First, only the large multi national corporations can afford to run multiple adds during the game costing eight figures. Secondly, their spending millions on well established brand names. Why? First, let's go over the commercials that stick out in my mind.

The commercials that I remember are the Doritos commercials where the guy is sitting on the bench eating his bag of Doritos, and his dog takes off his shock collar and puts it around his owners neck, shocks him, and eats his bag of Doritos. There were a couple of other good Doritos commercials. Budweiser had several commercials and the one that caught my attention is the one where all the towns people rushed to the road where the bridge had collapsed and formed a human bridge so the Budweiser truck could crossover and deliver beer to their town. Then there was the Coke commercial where a man is sleep walking through the Africa plains. He walks past a tree with a cougar in it, bumps into an elephant among a herd, steps into a canoe that magically crosses the river getting out just before a Rhinoceros crushes the canoe, walks into a building opening a refrigerator door covered with poisonous snakes to grab a bottle of Coke, walks a little further before sitting down and opening his Coke, and smiling as he enjoys the great taste while petting a Hyena.

So why did these companies decide to spend that kind of money in a down economy to advertise well established and well known products. Beer drinkers and soda drinkers are generally loyal to their brand so I don't see consumers switching brands, but maybe Budweiser and Coke are targeting the younger crowd from 16-25 in hopes of convincing them to switch brands. The Doritos commercials are saying we are a great tasting chip so try us if you haven't tried it before.

I believe the multi nationals with well established brand names want to make sure that they keep their brands in front of the public eye to say we believe in our product, we appreciate our loyal customers, and this is the the product that will deliver value.