Lessons learned from Super Bowl LII’s commercials: A pricing consultant’s perspective
Did you know that you can learn quite a lot about best-in-class consumer brand & portfolio strategy from watching this year’s Super Bowl ads? The lessons ranged from establishing a unique value prop to driving pantry loading to creating incremental usage occasions and more.
While watching last night’s game, I decided to nerd out a bit and keep track of which commercials I thought hit the nail on the head when it comes to communicating a compelling message from my experiences at Simon-Kucher & Partners helping to shape growth strategies for consumer goods companies.
Portfolio Breadth & Pantry Loading: Pringles
In Pringles’ WOW 2018 commercial, Bill Hader and some supporting crew discover that they can combine different flavors of Pringles to create their own flavors. The result? A Spicy Barbeque Chicken Pizza combination… which actually sounds kind of delicious. The ad did exactly as it intended: It showed off the breadth of flavors that Pringles offers to meet anyone’s particular craving while also gently suggesting that consumers should pantry load and buy more than one can at a time.
Whether the act of purchasing multiple Pringles’ cans in a single trip results in larger instant consumption occasions or it lasts a consumer a bit longer before their next snack purchase, either way, it is a win for Pringles.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gk0nVMU76bc
Incremental Occasions: Avocados From Mexico
In its #GuacWorld commercial, Avocados From Mexico embellishes the chaos that happens when you’ve got the avocados for a party, but forget the chips.
We’ve all been there, if you’ve got guacamole (or salsa), you need to make sure that you have enough chips or something similar to put it on. As the members of the Guac World society begin to panic after realizing they’ve left the chips outside of their new dome, their leader exclaims “WAIT!” Everything is going to be ok, because there are other great ways to enjoy avocados! In addition to guacamole, they show off all of the potential incremental occasions for which avocados can be used, such as avocado toast, burgers with avocado slices, and more.
As a huge fan of avocados and frequent consumer of avocado toast, I loved the commercial and would not be surprised to see the internet abuzz with more innovative ways to use avocados.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijVLdH5dt-c
Cross-sell via Complementary Goods: Doritos and Mountain Dew
In their two-part Super Bowl commercial, featuring the star power of Peter Dinklage and Morgan Freeman, Doritos and Mountain Dew show off their innovations and manage to intrigue consumers about how well the two new products may complement each other. Although it may have been rather strange, the 60-second dual feature in which Dinklage and Freeman taste Doritos Blaze and Mountain Dew Ice, respectively, before beginning to rap, genuinely caught my attention. I must admit I’m tempted to try not one but both of these two products, as a result of this very captivating cross-sell campaign.
The not-so-subtle link to Dinklage’s well-known role on Game of Thrones with the commercials’ battle of ice and fire were an added bonus for me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eKYR_iL5eU
What else?
Honorable mentions for other great commercials (albeit not necessarily from a pricing POV) go to: Amazon’s Alexa Loses Her Voice, Santander Bank’s Piggy and Bud Light’s The Bud Knight ad continuing everyone’s favorite “Dilly Dilly” storyline.
There are many different reasons why people enjoy getting together for the Super Bowl: From the passionate NFL fan to the chicken wing enthusiast to the person who simply wants to see a few entertaining commercials and the halftime show. I want to know what kind of viewer you are and what you thought were the best Super Bowl LII commercials from a pricing, strategy, branding, sales, etc. point of view?