Review of Super Bowl XLII Commercials: Anheuser-Busch to CareerBuilder

Based on a recent Associated Press article by Dan Sewell, companies such as Procter & Gamble Co. used Super Bowl XLII commercials as marketing tools to compensate for lagging TV viewing.

Procter & Gamble Co, which has an $8 billion global advertising budget, "has already aimed some brand promotions, using celebrities, online sites and contests, at football fans and families as the Super Bowl approaches on Sunday. But Tide detergent is going for the big play." (Google News article, "Marketers Make call on Super Bowl TV Ads", 2/1/08). Tide, a six-decade old brand of P&G, launched its first Super Bowl commercial ad, costing $2.7 million for 30 seconds. This Super Bowl commercial will be for Tide to Go, a cleaning pen that moved Tide out of the laundry room in 2005.

Fed-Ex, a Super Bowl commercial veteran, continued its "Relax, It's Fed-Ex" marketing campaign with this year's commercial, "Carrier Pigeons". This commercial is set in an office environment where an office clerk tries to handle the company's shipping needs with carrier pigeons. The chaos that ensues is the premise for the commercial and the need to use Fed-Ex.

All these commercials will be aired on YouTube.com AdBlitz. So what were the commercials, and what is the wrap?

Doritos - Song Contest Winner was "Message from your Heart" by Kina Grannis. The video was shown; the song was OK, but nothing really remarkable.

Audi of America - this commercial was good which starts by showing a mansion and goes in to show a man sleeping. Music is playing with a very ominous sound, like something bad is going to happen. The man wakes up and his pajama's and hands are covered in a black liquid. He then pulls back the covers to show the grill luxury car grill in guys bed (looks like a Mercedes or Cadillac hood ornament)....then the camera shows the front grill of the Audit R8 (which is AMAZING!!!) and the words come on the screen "Old Luxury...just got put on notice" . The car is then shown again leaving the driveway. This was a very cleaver mockery of the God Father.

Diet - Pepsi - Max - Starts with Joe Buck and Elway talking about the Super Bowl and Joe Buck is falling asleep. The commercial continues with everyone falling asleep with their head nodding forward and backward. There are rap artists dosing at an award ceremony y, father getting kicked while pushing child on swing, mechanic with car getting crushed. Then everyone drinks Diet-Pepsi Max and they all start doing the side head bob that was done by the Lounge Guys in Saturday Night Live. The next frame is Jimmy Fallon in a dry cleaners and walks out saying "stop that"!

Bridgestone - the Super Bowl commercial starts out with a squirrel in the road and the car heading for it. The squirrel screams, all the animals in the forest scream, the woman in the car screams, and car make sharp turn and misses the squirrel.

There is a second Super Bowl commercial for Bridgestone, with the same layout of a car driving down the street and there is a deer. The car swerves and misses the deer, then there is Alice Cooper and the car swerves and misses him. As the car continues, there is Richard Simmons doing his exercise routine. The driver puts his foot on the gas pedal...then at the last minute the car swerves and misses him.

GoDaddy.com - this Super Bowl commercial was inventive. All the people are at a party waiting to watch the Super Bowl commercial. There is a man at the computer and he is saying that he is going to watch Danica Patrick's revealing add at godaddy.com and it is not available on TV. All of the people jump up and go over to the computer.

Cars.com - had two commercials with a man going to a car dealership to purchase a car. The first one has him telling the salesman that he is glad that he is going to give him a good deal so that he does not need to have him fight in the stone circle. The second Super Bowl commercial for Cars.com is the same man, but now has him telling the salesman that he is glad that he is getting a good deal so he does not have to go to "Plan B" and have his head shrunk. Then another man comes out with a small head and says, can I go home now, I have a shrunken head.

Tide to Go - This Super Bowl commercial was very funny and really mad ethe point that if you are trying to make an impression and you have a stain on your shirt, nothing else comes across. The man is talking at a job interview, and as he is talking, the stain is also talking. Very distracting. The tagline at the end of the commercial is "make your own talking stain at mytalkingstain.com". This site has a link to film your own spoof that might get put on TV. This is a great marketing campaign....ingenious!!!

CareerBuilder.com - There are two commercials in the Super Bowl from CareerBuilder. The first is a woman sitting at her computer and watching her boss eat a lobster in her office. As she is sitting there, her heart jumps out of the woman's chest and goes in to bosses office. It goes onto the desk and holds up a sign with "I Quit" written on this sign. The tagline is to follow your heart....this was pretty good.

The second Super Bowl commercial for CareerBuilder is a man sitting at his desk and a firefly/fairy type of character comes to the window and asks him what he is wishing for...the man says a new job. The firefly/fairy gets attacked by a spider...the tagline is "wishing won't get you a better job".

SoBe Life Waters - The Super Bowl commercial starts with the lizard taking a sip of a SoBe Life Water and begins to dance. The model is also dancing. The lizards all start dancing to "Thriller" , this was an ok commercial.

Planters Nuts - This Super Bowl commercial was funny...I am a woman and I still found this funny. The woman is not very attractive, but has men following her and falling all over her...this continues as she gets on the bus, is going into work and then it shows her getting ready. She opens a can of Planters Cashews, takes one and rubs it on her neck, wrists and in her cleavage. Then she goes and walks on the street with the men following her, and she is strutting with the men following her.

Pepsi - Justin Timberlake is in a restaurant and there is a guy with chopsticks up his nose. As he is telling him that it is gross, he suddenly gets pulled from his chair and out the door, this continues with him being flung into the street, down the street, and over cars. As this is happening, you see someone sipping from a straw. Justin Timberlake finally ends up in the yard with three girls drinking Pepsi, and the announcer says "every sip gets you closer to Justin Timberlake mp3's, then a flat screen TV hits him in head, and the announcer continues to say and flat screen TV's. This Super Bowl Commercial is pretty good, as what is happening is unexpected.

Coca cola - this Super Bowl commercial shows the balloons at the Macy's parade. Underdog and Stu from Family Guy are trying to get the Coke bottle balloon. They follow the Coke bottle balloon down side streets; get hit against windows while trying to get the bottle. Finally, the Coke bottle rises up and Charlie Brown gets it.

Anheuser-Busch had several spots, visit Bud-Bowl for the commercial clips

1. Bud-light no longer comes with the ability to breathe fire - This commercial was humorous with the man lighting candles by breathing fire. He then sneezes and starts setting everything on fire.

2. Bud-light - there are men with their wives/girlfriends that are going to a wine and cheese party. The man comes in holding a large wheel of cheese. He goes into the kitchen and under the cheese is a 5 pack of Bud-light. Then another man has a baguette with Bud-light in it, then another man opens a box of wine and it is a TV.

3. Dalmatian trains Clydesdale - there is one horse that does not make it in the Clydesdale team in this Super Bowl commercial. Then the Dalmatian begins to train him to the "Rocky" theme song. After the training, the horse gets to be on the team and the man says welcome aboard Hank and the horse gives Dalmatian a High 5

4. Carlos Mencia teaches English - In this Super Bowl commercial, Carlos Mencia is trying to teach the men how to talk English with an accent and pick up women. They all fail so Carlos tells them he will show them how it is done. He tries to pick up this one woman and she says she is already with someone....he says "Bud-light" and smiles!

5. Cavemen - this Super Bowl commercial shows cavemen trying to move a stone cooler of Bud-light. Another caveman comes out and says he invented the wheel to help move the Bud-light to the party. So the cavemen are shown carrying the stone cooler on the wheel. The cavemen yell that the wheel sucks. They are then in the party and smash the bottle with a rock and say "bottle opener sucks.".