Feelin' Good – How the Top Super Bowl LI Ads Got the US Smiling

Mr Clean 

Mr Clean capitalised on nostalgia, leveraging a spin on its iconic character to elicit strong levels of Happy across demographics, although the final twist was a particular hit with women.

Skittles

By contrast, Skittles did not lean on old tropes. It’s fresh, simple but slightly surreal concept was just as effective in drawing smiles from its audience. Both were exemplary in engaging across young and old, male and female viewers. They had universal emotional appeal - a key ingredient to Super Bowl success.

By and large the rest of the top 11 all used humor to good effect. A special mention goes to Wonder Pistachios, which was propelled into joint 5th place by a moment of slapstick comedy. At 15-seconds long it was the most efficient emoter of our top 11, and with 30 seconds of Super Bowl air-time going for $5,000,000, perhaps the most cost-effective!

Speaking of good value, King’s Hawaiian was able to slip into the top 10 with a relatively simple, low-budget piece, affirming an oft-made observation at Realeyes – high-production values do not guarantee strong emotional engagement.

That being said, celebrities (or well-known animated characters!) are peppered throughout the top performers, featuring in 7 of the 11 commercials. In the best cases - especially Bai, Buick - these celebs are deployed in surreal, unusual, narratives.

Notable omissions from the Top 11 include Budweiser’s 'Born the Hard Way', which focused on the company’s immigrant founders. It caught the media's attention, generating huge social media buzz, but scored a 5, ranking 6th worst among the 83 commercials. Airbnb's We Accept and Coca-Cola’s 'It's Beautiful', which also centered on social issues ranked 3rd and 2nd worst, respectively.