I took a tip off of Imagewerks Marketing today. On their blog, they will occasionally post an ad they really love called “Favorite Ad Friday,” and while I’m not writing about Arby’s “We Have Pepsi” ad, I did want to share one of my all-time favorite ad campaigns with you all today:
Back in the mid-80s, Absolut Vodka was trying to break into the American market and created a print campaign that has become iconic in the marketing world and even merited its own book (and sequel). The idea behind this campaign was to portray the brand in a world ideal as its product by showing its bottle in about every situation possible. While not always PG-rated, the creativity of Absolut is unparalleled. My favorite two ads are listed below:
Probably what makes this ad campaign so successful is its extreme flexibility—in an Absolut world, things are what the consumer wants them to be. The brand managed to create a formula for its campaign while still creating eye-catching bottles with every ad. (It just proves how little copy you need sometimes for a successful ad.) And despite the age-old debate about alcohol consumption, these print ads ran for 15 years, which is nearly a lifetime in advertising. If you’d like to see more ads, check out this article from The Daily Meal to see a series of them.
Do you have a favorite advertising campaign?
[…] this happens to me, I tend to think back to content I love. For example, last week, I just posted a short blurb about a cool ad campaign by Absolut Vodka and left it to you all to pursue that further if you so chose. Same idea this week: I don’t want […]
[…] but to see it in a totally new form cements our visual memory of the bottle. (Much like the way Absolut Vodka did its branding strategy.) The ad also includes its signature red throughout the piece, providing […]
[…] a consistent voice and structure for ads can really solidify a company’s brand—just look at Absolut Vodka. Even without Arby’s being mentioned, it’s obvious whose ad it is from the first three seconds […]