Evian's dancing babies make a comeback

Evian is back, and so are its dancing babies.

The bottled water company's adverts have become synonymous with dancing babies since 1998, working along side their slogan of "live young".

This new ad, created by BETC Paris, see's adults catching their reflection and seeing themselves as a baby, a dancing baby.

Whilst this is in no way as entertaining as the previous outings for the talented tots, it has it's moments.

Watch it and the previous ads below.

70's style beer adverts for a soft drink?

The new ads for Dr Pepper Ten look more like a beer commercial from the 70's, featuring a rugged woodsman living off the land and at one with the animals.

In reality it's a comical remake to advertise a low-calorie version of the popular drink. Continuing on from their previous strap-line of 'it's not for women' (very similar to the UK's Yorkie slogan) they introduce a character who can only be described as a 'man's man' in a series of ads by agency Deutsch.

Funny and part of a current trend hitting the U.S to make ads that mimic the style of old ads.

Watch the series below.

V&A membership campaign

In an effort to boost membership, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, has teamed up with Rose Design to produce a series of print ads.

Rose Design worked with photographer Nick Turpin and copywriter Jim Davies to create the posters, which aim to highlight the benefits of becoming a member.

The posters all feature black and white shots of visitors enjoying exhibits and objects from the V&A's vast trove of historical artifacts.

55 Years of the Lego Brick

To celebrate 55 years, Lego has created a tumblr account called "55 years of the brick".

They've released 55 simple but effective print adverts, asking you to imagine a song, band, movie or book.

See if you can guess what the ads represent - there are a few challenging ones.

The Lego posting has a lot of advertising around it, which can be annoying, but you can view them all at Gizmodo here without the ads.

Does a bear wash it's pelt in the woods?

Washing machines these days are one of the bare-necessities of life, or at least that's what Samsung would like you to think with its new ad.

The fantastic ad features their Eco-bubble washing machines, with a filming crew in a frozen landscape, proving that the machine washes "brilliantly", even with the coldest of water, until they are approached by a huge bear.

The bear, after scaring off the crew, begins to disrobe and take advantage of the machine.
The ending is very clever, so definitely worth a watch

Meerkats out-do Vinnie Jones for Most-liked TV ad of 2012

According to a recent Nielsen report, Compare the Market's TV ad featuring  “compare the meerkat” founder Sergei handing a free meerkat toy to a window cleaner, was more "liked" than The British Heart Foundation's ad featuring footballer-turned-actor Vinnie Jones, demonstrating CPR to the tune of Staying Alive.

Nielson has compiled a top ten most-liked and most memorable TV ads of 2012, with the Compare the Market ad clinching the top spot ahead of The British Heart Foundation and Kerrygold Butter in third. It is the third year that Compare the Market has featured, and their second time at the top, whilst it is the second time for retailer John Lewis, who managed fourth place this year.

The report has lead to the thought that animals have replaced celebrities as the must-have to make ads more memorable, with four of the top ten featuring animals, whilst only 1 features a celebrity, this is a trend that has seen the number of celebrities being in the top ten drop from 2 in 2011 and 4 in 2010, whilst the number of memorable ads involving animals was 2 for both years. The other conclusion marketers can take from this is that a strong emotional situation in adverts can help people connect to them more, such as the children returning home in the Kerrygold ad, where-as comedy is not as important as it once was.

Darren Moor, Nielsen’s VP of advertising effectiveness, says: “Animals have replaced celebrities as the new stars of many of the nation’s favourite TV ads in 2012, and we expect their effectiveness as brand icons and storytellers to continue as a theme next year.”
Moor adds: "The glaring, and surprising, omission is that not a single Olympic or sport-related ad features amongst the most liked in what has been the most successful year in the history of British sport. Advertisers may need to work harder to find out why sports ads are not connecting as well with a nation that loves its sport if their ads are to appear on the winners’ podium in 2013.”

Nielsen ranked the TV ads on ‘likeability’ and ‘memorability’ each day with the list based on over 1.25 million survey results from viewers watching evening TV in the UK. The likeability index is a measure of the number of TV viewers who like an ad they saw, and whose brand they can remember, during the normal course of their TV viewing. Scores for likeability and memorability have been tracked every day for each of this year’s nearly 7,000 new ads, shortly after each has been broadcast.

Scary ad for air conditioning

This has got to be one of the oddest ads for an air conditioning company ever.

South American home electronics brand BGH has created this very atmospheric ad that features a variety of frightening sunbathers and other sun worshipers sweating away in high temperatures watched by a psychopath that wants to put them out of their 'misery'.

But its OK as he has air conditioning from BGH so he won't be heading out into the heat.

Not for the faint hearted but worth a watch just to see how they do it in South America. Apologies for the picture but it sets the scene.




Shot by Fallon London.

Waterstones campaign that makes you think

We like this new ad campaign for Waterstones by Leagas Delaney. Nice copy writing that hits home and gets you thinking.

Surreal ads from Drambuie

A very surreal advertising campaign from Drambuie, following on from their 'A Taste of the Extraordinary' press campaign. Did Dali have a hand in this?

Not the monsters you would want to meet on a night out!

See the ad below:



Drambuie's 'Extraordinary Bar' cinema commercial, written by Sell! Sell!, directed by Chino Moya and produced through HSI.

Get your own classic Economist ad

Do you remember these classic Economist ads? Well now you can buy them as limited edition prints.

Russell Blackmore, who used to be an employee of The Economist, has formed a partnership with the magazine to print some of the most iconic posters.

These are from their 'White out of Red' ad campaign and are available hand framed in a limited edition of 250. They were originally created by Abbott Mead Vickers.

See more of these at Creative Review or buy yours at Sonic Editions.

Print ads that come to life

Looking for a way to bring your advertising to life then take a look at this print ad for Lexus. With a little help from an iPad the ad comes to life.

Lexus developed a special technology for this that it's calling "CinePrint."

"Most traditional mashups feature print ads that redirect to a digital experience away from the printed page," the automaker says. "CinePrint technology flips that on its head, creating a tactile and visceral connection that brings one closer to the printed page with a multi-sensory experience that combines sight, sound and touch."

Take a look at the film below to see how it works. Brilliant!

The Cravendale cats are back

The 'cats with thumbs' are back in a new campaign from Cravendale.

In this teaser ad the question is 'What happened to all the Milkmen?'

Presumably we will find out soon enough.

Gravity, air and ping pong balls

This interesting ad for ASICS styles was inspired by the fact that 33 joints in the foot allow it to move efficiently.

33 by ASICS™ styles apparently encourages natural foot movement during workouts and every day use while remaining lightweight and thus they combined ping pong balls, air and gravity to create this ad.

Find out more by ASICS here

 

Funny ads do no better that straight ads

Here's some interesting research from the States that funny ads are no more effective than others.

Ace Metric looked at the ads that ran during the Super Bowl. Apparently one in five TV ads in the States are funny, and Super Bowl ads are three times funnier than the rest. But none of this makes much difference in selling stuff, according to new research by syndicated ad-testing firm Ace Metrix

The Index compares brand to average, so Doritos ads had 6.35 times as many people who found them funny as an average ad in the study. The Ace effectiveness score takes into account a variety of rating factors, including how much consumers like the ad, pay attention to it, and are persuaded by it to want the product or service.

Find out more about this study on AdAge. Makes interesting reading.

Does anyone know of similar studies in the UK?

See one of the funniest ads below:

Anti-smoking ad that pints out hypocrisy

Thailand has launched a very thought provoking anti-smoking ad which points out the hypocrisy of smokers when approached by a child who asks them for a light.

Every smoker the child approached tried to persuade him not to smoke and how dangerous to his health it is.

The child finishes the stunt by handing the smoker a leaflet explaining their hypocrisy.

The ad received more than 960,000 views before being taken down but it has now reappeared again.

Please view it below and let us know what you think.

Agency: Ogilvy Thailand

Winning advertising at the Cannes Lion Festival of Creativity

This year's the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity saw many of the world's leading advertising agencies win awards for some fantastic creative.

There were 15 individual winners for ads out of the 5,195 entries, a demonstration that the advertising industry is still producing some outstanding quality productions.

See three of the winning entries below or visit Adweek to see all 15.  



Chipotle "Back to the Start" - Agency: Creative Artists Agency, Los Angeles



Canal+ "The Bear",  Agency: BETC, Paris



The Guardian "Three Little Pigs", Agency: BBH, London

Dad dancing, rapping and socks with sandals

Sandals with brown socks, ride on lawn mowers, Disney videos and BBQ's - all part of Dad's Life, an ad for American Greetings.

Celebrating Father's Day with four 'super cool' rapping dads is one not to be missed.

Who said dads can't dance, or rap for that matter.