Posts Tagged ‘2011’

Dairy Queen’s “Mini Blizzard Treatment” winners

Posted by Beardy on June 6th, 2011

Did you vote for me in Dairy Queen’s “Mini Blizzard Treatment” video contest? If so, thanks! I really appreciate the support. But….I didn’t win a Mini Cooper. And to be honest, I kind of knew my chances weren’t very good in this particular contest. (Some background: In the DQ contest, 24 finalists were picked and the 6 people who’s video got the most votes would win a Mini Cooper. The vote counts were hidden during the voting and the Top 6 videos were revealed last week.) Click here to see the 6 winning videos.

At first I tried really hard to get as many votes as possible. But after a few days I took the time to check out the competition. If you’re in a video contest where votes alone determine the winners, you should always do a little research about the people you’re up against. For instance, if the contest is being run on facebook (like the DQ contest was) then try and find out how many facebook friends your competitors have. Just search for their names and their profile will come up. And if it’s not totally set to private, you can see how many friends they have. I have a mere 220 facebook friends so when I saw that several of the finalists had more than 1,000 friends, I knew they’d be hard to beat.

Moving beyond facebook, I also checked twitter. I searched for terms like “Vote, DQ, contest, mini cooper.” And sure enough, I saw tweets from several people in the contest including one guy who had almost 4,900 twitter followers.  And after I did some more digging I discovered that this person was a semi-pro filmmaker with a gigantic and enthusiastic online fan base.  But as it turned out, maybe some of his fans were a little too enthusiastic.  To my surprise, this guy didn’t make the Top 6.  One of his teammates tweeted that their entry was disqualified for “getting too many votes.”  That could have been a joke but I don’t think it was.  I don’t know if they cheated or even if they really got disqualified.  But their entry recived hundreds of comments from people saying “I Voted!”  So I can’t imagine how they couldn’t have won.  Either they cheated and were disqualified or else most of the other contestants cheated in order to beat them.

But I digress.  After Facebook and Twitter the next place you should check is Google News. You can learn amazing things from google news. If you do a blog search you can see if any bloggers are promoting any entries. And if you search Google’s news feed you can see if any contestants have gotten the media to do a story on them.

The point of all this research is to help you decide whether or not it is worth it to try and get more votes in the contest. If you discover one of your competitors has 1,000 facebook friends, 3,000 twitter followers, and a blog that’s read by 20,000 people a month then you’ll know that you might be fighting a losing battle.

So after I did my research I knew that there were 3 or 4 finalists that could get in the top 6 without breaking a sweat. And it looked like there were 2 or 3 other contestants that had a really strong chance of making it too. Of course, I happen to run a semi-popular website (yes, this one) and I have A LOT of good contacts on the web that could help me get votes. So I was thinking I might be able to squeak into the Top 6.  I don’t know where I eventually ranked but I bet I came in 7th or 8th.

Even though I didn’t win a car, being in this contest was a really positive experience for me.  My campaign for votes had some very interesting and unexpected consequences.  I think this is one of those cases where a loss leads to an even greater (metaphorical) victory.  I can’t talk about some of the things that happened because of this contest but I will say this; the support I got from my family and friends and even the readers of this site really warmed my cockles.  It’s a very George-Baily-esque experience to have hundreds of people you’ve known for years rally behind you and wish you well.  I mean, people I haven’t talked to since high school voted for me.  Ex-girlfriends from 10 years ago voted for me.  Former employers and co-workers voted for me.  Random crew people I worked with on random projects 3 years voted for me.  Yeah, I know it only takes 20 seconds to vote in an online contest.  But it was nice to know that so many people I’ve crossed paths with cared enough to try and help me and then wrote me to let me know they still had my back.  So that was nice.  Plus, did you know that when you win a new car you get stuck paying like $7,000 in taxes on it!!  Pfffft….so man, did I dodge a bullet on that one or what?

As is the case with most voted-based video contests, most of the winning videos aren’t so great.  You can see all the results here.  But below I’ll post the best winner followed by the not-best winner.

One of Six Winners.  Prize: A Mini Cooper:

One of Six Winners. Prize: A Mini Cooper:

I have to say, I was totally shocked to see that 2nd video make the Top six. It was definitely not on my list of likely winners. The video didn’t get that many comments and the guy who made it has only 191 facebook friends. (only one vote per FB account counted, BTW) Also, no one blogged about his entry, no one tweeted about it and the media didn’t do any stories about it. So where the heck did all his votes come from?

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Jackson Hewitt fails to pay out $20K in contest prizes

Posted by Beardy on May 30th, 2011

On March 1st, the Tax prep company Jackson Hewitt announced the start of their “Win Win with the Big Check” video contest.  People were supposed to print out a big “check” that said “Win Win” on it from the contest site and then film themselves passing the check from their left to their right.  The idea was that Jackson Hewitt would edit all the entries together and it would look like dozens of people were handing around the same piece of paper. Twenty finalists would be picked via a public vote and then Jackson Hewitt would pick one grand prize winner.  That lucky individual would win $10,000 plus they would also get to pick a friend or family member that would receive an extra $10,000. (hence the name “Win Win.”)

On April 19th, Jackson Hewitt announced 20 finalists and posted the video montage of all the entries on their facebook page.  Here it is:


Oooops….that video is set to private.  That’s weird.  But you know what’s even weirder?  A reader who happened to make the finals of this contest e-mailed me last week and said that the official “Big Check” rules have disappeared from the web. On top of that, Jackson Hewitt has recently stopped responding to calls and e-mails from the finalists and someone at the company has been deleting the “what’s happening with this contest?” messages that people have been posting to the official .

So did happen to this contest?  Bankruptcy…that’s what happened.  Last Tuesday Jackson Hewitt filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.  That means that if you were one of the 20 finalists in their big “Win Win” video contest you’re pretty much shit out of luck!  There is almost no chance in hell that the $20,000 in prize money will ever be awarded to anyone.  Almost 6 weeks have gone by without any winner being announced.  And I think that delay was intentional.  You see, if Jackson Hewitt had picked a winner before filing Chapter 11 that person would be able to participate in the company’s bankruptcy proceedings.  They could make a claim against them and eventually get some or all of their $20,000 prize.  But since no winners were picked, Jackson Hewitt doesn’t technically owe any one person the prize money.

The rules of a contest are like a contract between the sponsor and the contestants.  Contestants create entries in exchange for an opportunity to win the promised prizes.  If a company just decided not to pay out those promised prizes, all the contestants could file a civil suit against the company.  But you can’t actually sue a company for something that happened before they filed for Chapter 11 protection until after they emerge from bankruptcy.  So even if a finalist in the Win Win contest wanted to try and force Jackson Hewitt to pay up they’ll have to wait a long ass time before they can file a civil suit.

Now obviously I don’t think anyone of importance at Jackson Hewitt was thinking about some little video contest when they were getting ready to file for bankruptcy.  But I do think that the folks in the marketing department were probably told a few weeks ago they should stop paying their debts because something was about to happen.  So the team in charge of the contest dragged their feet on picking a winner for as few weeks and now, whoops…they can’t pay out the prize money because suddenly the company is in Chapter 11.

If you were a finalist in Jackson Hewitt’s “Win Win’ video contest, be sure to send me an e-mail if the company ever does anything to make this right.  I think the decent thing for Jackson Hewitt to do would be to contact the finalists ASAP and say a winner will be declared once the company comes out of Chapter 11.  Or maybe they could promise to eventually just split the $20,000 among the 20 finalists.  But I think it’s a lot more likely that Jackson Hewitt will just pretend like this contest never happened and never pay out the promised prize money.

June 1, 2011 Update: Looks like Jackson Hewitt just needed to be reminded that they were running a video contest.  A finalist in the “Big Check” contest sent this post the JH and now the company has announced they’ll be picking a winner next week.  Full story here:  https://videocontestnews.com/2011/05/31/jackson-hewitt-promises-to-pick-a-big-check-winner/

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Taxslayer screws up their video contest AGAIN!

Posted by Beardy on May 18th, 2011

Other than Dorito’s Crash the Super Bowl contest, Taxslayer.com’s annual video contest may be the longest running video contest on the web.  It was started way, way back in the pre-HD dark ages of 2008.  That first installment of the contest was run before my time so I don’t really know how smoothly it went.  But I do know that one submitted commercial won $25,000 and even aired on TV during the 2009 tax season.  But after that first year, Taxslayer has managed to run one terrible contest after another.  The ineptitude of the contest organizers and their lack of respect for their contestants is just ridiculous. For the third year in a row, Taxslayer allowed filmmakers to waste time and money by changing the contest weeks after it was launched.  (I don’t want to clog up this post with old news so if you’d like to read about how Taxslayer screwed up their 2009 and 2010 video contests, click the comment button for a quick explanation) I don’t know if account-types just don’t understand how to communicate with creative-types but I think it’s more likely Taxslayer just doesn’t give a shit about the people who enter their contests.

The 2010 Taxslayer contest was such a disaster (they retroactively canceled the contest 3 weeks after the deadline passed so they wouldn’t have to pay out any prizes) that I was totally flabbergasted when I learned that they were going to try and and run a new version of the contest for 2011.  For the first time, Taxslayer abandoned the “make our next TV commercial” idea and replaced it with a good, old-fashioned video contest.  The requirements were simple; contestants had to make a video that demonstrated “The Craziest of Funniest way you’ve ever done your taxes.”  And to make things even simpler, Taxslayer even said they were NOT looking for commercials for their company.  They just wanted funny videos.  In fact, the videos only needed to mention “Taxslayer” once.  So again, it really seemed like they did NOT want a standard commercial-style video.

Because Taxslayer screwed their contestants so badly last year I decided to stay far away from this year’s version.  I had pretty much forgotten about the contest when one day about 6 weeks ago I got 3 e-mails in one afternoon from filmmakers who had just recived strange e-mails from Taxslayer. The letters they got notified them that their entries (and a lot of other entries) were being pulled from the contest. Here’s a copy of the letter the rejected filmmakers got:

So Taxslayer bounced the entries that didn't meet the established guidelines. Or at least that's what they said. What really happened is that the people who set up this contest screwed up and didn't communicate to contestants what they actually wanted. Here's a screen grab that a contestant sent to me of the original rules:

In case you can’t read that tiny, fuzzy type, the rules say that contestants should:

“Submit a video demonstrating the craziest or funniest way you’ve done your taxes. Entries should reference Taxslayer at least once.”

But compare that to this line from the letter that the rejected filmmakers received:

“We would like a short video demonstrating the craziest or funniest way you’ve done your taxes WITH TAXSLAYER.COM.”

Catch the difference?  In the original rules, Taxslayer forgot to mention the “with Taxslayer.com” part.  So naturally, filmmakers shot videos that showed a crazy way they had done their taxes WITHOUT taxslayer.  I know that’s what I would have done.  It seemed like the whole point of the contest was to show how crazy it is to do your taxes without Taxslayer.

Because the folks at Taxslayer were simply to incompetent too articulate exactly what kind of videos they wanted, they decided to punish filmmakers for not being able to read their minds.  They rejected all the entries that weren’t about Taxslayer and told contestants they could re-edit their entries to comply with the (new) guidelines. To be fair, Taxslayer did tell filmmakers that they could re-submit their videos without making any changes but come on….there was no way any of those entries ever had a shot at winning.

Here’s the video that Taxslayer ultimately selected as this year’s winner:

2011 Taxslayer winner. Prize: $10,000:


That’s actually a pretty good video.  I like it and it perfectly fits the contest “guidelines.” And it’s even kind of topical, no?  Taxslayer just announced the winner on May 5th so I can’t help but wonder if the recent news about the Seal team that took out Osama Bin Laden influenced the judges decisions.

At this point I’d post a link to the contest page and encourage you to check out the other entries…but I can’t. Taxslayer pulled the entire contest off the web almost as soon as the winner was announced.  You can’t even watch the winning video on any of taxslayer’s sites.  It’s only by luck that I happened to find a version of the winning commercial on vimeo.  And yes…the video that won is a commercial.  For all of Taxslayer’s talk about how they didn’t want an “ad” they wound up picking a video that looks a whole lot like a TV commercial.  It’s 30 seconds long, it ends with a Taxslayer.com title card and even demonstrates that you can do your taxes on taxslayer from your Ipad.

When Taxslayer canceled last year’s video contest I thought for sure they wouldn’t have the balls to try and run it again this year.  So will Taxslayer bring the contest back in 2012?  Oh, I’m sure they will.  But if they do, take my advice; don’t waste your time, money and talent entering.  If you do enter I’m sure you’ll only wind up getting screwed over in some new, crazy way.

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Live Crash the Super Bowl results

Posted by Beardy on February 6th, 2011

The second quarter of the Super Bowl is just starting but surprisingly, 5 Crash the Super Bowl finalist ads have already aired!   So I guess there’s just one spot left to go.  I really expected Fritolay to spread them out a little more.  But these early airings must mean that Pepsi and Doritos genuinely and really want these commercials to land in the top 3 on the USA Today Ad Meter.  If you missed a commercial break making a chicken wing run, here are the results so far.  These are the ads that aired tonight in the order they ran.  Titles in Red are Doritos ads and titles in Blue are for Pepsi Max.  Remember, you can see all of this year’s CTSB finalists .

2011 CRASH THE SUPER BOWL WINNERS and AD METER SCORES

1.  Pug Attack.  SCORE: 8.35.  RANK:  Tie for #1

2.  The Best Part.  SCORE:  7.27. RANK:  #14

3.  Love Hurts.  SCORE:  7.56. RANK:  #5

4.  House Sitting.  SCORE:  7.68.  RANK:  #4

5. Torpedo Cooler. SCORE:  6.68. RANK:  #24

6. First Date.  SCORE:  7.52. RANK:  #7

UPDATE:  The ad meter scores are in and the results are unbelievable!  I did not see this coming but the Crash the Super Bowl winners came closer than ever before to winning the 5 million dollar bonus.  Pug Attack tied with the Bud Light Dog Party ad for first place.  House Sitting was the #4 ad of the night and Love Hurts was ranked #5.  Even though he won on a tie, the director of Pug Attack will receive a One Million Dollar bonus.  Check back with us tomorrow and we’ll go over the results in more detail.

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Which Crash the Super Bowl ads will air on sunday?

Posted by Beardy on February 4th, 2011

The last day to cast your vote in the Crash the Super Bowl contest was January 30th and by now all 10 finalists should be enjoying their week-long trip to sunny Dallas, TX. (current conditions: 20°F and “snowy”)  It’s gotta be nerve-racking to wait a full week before learning whether or not your ad is going to air during the big game.  But hopefully all the selected filmmakers will be able to chill out and enjoy themselves…in Dallas.  I just checked and in the previous three years that the CTSB happened (2007, 2009 and 2010) the Super Bowl always took place in Miami or Tampa.  But don’t feel too bad for the 2011 winners.  At least they have good BBQ in Texas.  If the contest comes back next year and you make it to the finals you’ll get to spend a week in fabulous Indianapolis, Indiana!

But 2012 is a long way off.  So let’s focus on the immediate future and talk about how this year’s contest might finish up.  I didn’t follow this year’s competition as closely as I did last year but I do think I have a decent idea as to which ads are going to make it to air.  I’m basing my predictions on several factors:

1. News and Social Media Coverage, 2. Finalist’s “vote for us” campaigns, 3. Youtube views, 4. Entry Quality and finally 5. My Ass (Frankly, that’s where one or two of these picks got pulled from)

So here are the ads that I think are going to make it to air on Sunday.  I’ll list them in the order I think they will run.  Keep in mind that the earlier an ad airs, the better it will probably do on the ad meter.  And Fritolay gets to pick when an ad plays regardless of how many votes it got.  So that means the first two ads to play are the ones that Fritolay thinks have the best shot of landing in the Top 3 on the ad meter.  Click the thumbnails to watch the ads.

1.  Pug Attack: If this isn’t the first Doritos ad to air on Sunday I’ll eat a giant, foam Cheese Hat.  Pug Attack has absolutely crushed all of its competition on youtube.  Right now it’s at 125,000 views.  The next most viewed 2011 finalist is “The Best Part” with 61,000 views.  Pug Attack has also gotten a lot of press and social media coverage so I think it’s a safe bet that it got enough votes to make Doritos’ Top 2.  And if it didn’t, it’s proven popular enough that the Doritos judges would chose to run it.  And one more thing; as I’ve mentioned I was disappointed that Doritos picked this ad since it seems like a blatant rip-off of last year’s CTSB winner, Underdog.  The similarities between the two spots are undeniable so Doritos must have picked this ad because it reminded them of Underdog.  So their goal may be to create a symmetry between last year’s winner and this one (which they hope will be the big winner of the night.)  If that’s the case they’ll be running Pug Attack first since last year they ran Underdog first.

2. Torpedo Cooler: For some reason, the filmmaker who made Torpedo Cooler has done almost no campaigning for his ad…at least as far as I can see.  I haven’t seen a “vote for torpedo cooler” website or facebook page and I’ve only seen a few, random “vote for torpedo cooler” blog posts and tweets.  This is weird when you consider the fact that Torpedo Cooler was directed by a filmmaker (and friend of VCN) named Brendan Hayword.  And last year, Brendon made the CTSB finals with a commercial called “The Smackout.”  Brendan campaigned like crazy in 2010 but in the end, he was the only person who’s ad DIDN’T air during the Super Bowl.  From what I’ve read and been told, the Fritolay team and the other finalists felt pretty bad for the guy since he was basically the only non-winner in the group.  So why would this filmmaker work so hard and spend so much money (According to this press release, Torpedo Cooler’s budget was $4,500) to try and get back to the Crash the Super Bowl finals and then exert almost no effort to get enough votes to make it to air?  I think it’s because he was already informed weeks ago that Torpedo Cooler will be the ad that the Pepsi Max judges choose to air.   And you know what?  I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.  If Pepsi knew right from the start which ad they wanted to air I actually think it was pretty cool of them to let the filmmaker know so he wouldn’t waste a month busting his ass, hustling for votes he didn’t need to get.

3.  The Best Part: As I’ve said, this spot really grew on me.  Yeah it’s kinda gross but if it airs during the big game a lot of people will probably be quoting this ad on Monday.  (mmm, cheese!)  The team that made this spot did a lot of campaigning and they have a robust following on .  So I think they’re going to get enough votes to make the Top 2.  And this is going to sound like kind of a weird theory but if you go to the official Crash The Super Bowl youtube channel, The Best Part is their “featured video” and it’s set to Auto-Play whenever you visit the page.  That’s a little trick to boost a video’s view count if you have a popular channel.  Fritolay is proud of the viral success of the their CTSB finalists.  So I think they might be trying to jack up this ads’ view count because they don’t think many people will rush to their computers after the Super Bowl to re-watch a commercial where one guy licks another guy’s cheesy fingers.

4.  Zero Calories, Psshh: This spot makes my list because it’s gotten a considerable amount of press coverage.  But it also has a big advantage because the video was essentially the combined effort of a bunch of employees at a florida Ad agency.  That means that every employee at the company and all of their friends and family members were probably voting for “Zero Calories, Psshh,” religiously all month long.  Plus hey, they’re an ad agency.  So they better know how to promote their own work!  As for its placement during the Super Bowl, I think Fritolay will try and bury it during the middle of the game since it’s not as strong as most of the other videos in the Top 10.  Last year, the last Crash the Super Bowl ad that aired during the 4th quarter wound up being the most watched commercial OF ALL TIME.  So I think Doritos and Pepsi will want to try and finish strong and air some of their best ads, last.

5. House Sitting: I don’t think “House Sitting” will get enough votes to make it to air but I do think this will be the spot that the Doritos judges pick.  I’m personally not crazy about this ad but a lot of people seem to really like it and it would probably do ok on the ad meter.  It also goes very quickly which means that a lot of people would want to watch it again later on line.  Predicting which ad Doritos will want to run is a tough call.  If not “House Sitting” the slot will probably go to Birthday Wish.  But House Sitting has several things going for it that “Birthday Wish” doesn’t.  For one, Doritos appear all throughout House Sitting but they only get about 3 seconds of good screen time in Birthday Wish.  House Sitting is also one of the only finalist ads to feature a non-white actor and it’s the first CTSB finalist ad ever to be created by and African American female director.  Diversity is important to fritolay (as it should be) and so if the judges have to pick between House Sitting and Birthday Wish I think they’ll give it to House Sitting.

6. Love Hurts: This is one of my personal favorites and I think it would go over really well during the Super Bowl.  The big, shocking slapstick surprise at the end should really help it score well on the ad meter.  The video has gotten a decent amount of social media coverage and it’s actually the most viewed Pepsi Max finalist ad on Fritolay’s youtube channel (41,000 views.)  Because three of the five Pepsi Max finalist ads are….well, not so great, that should really help Love Hurts get enough votes to make it to air.  If a random person who had no connection to any of the finalists watched all five Pepsi Max ads I don’t seem many people voting for anything other than Torpedo Cooler or Love Hurts.  And if Torpedo Cooler DOES get enough votes to air, Pepsi’s only other logical pick would be Love Hurts.

7.  ??????: For the last two years, Doritos has surprised contestants by running an extra Crash the Super Bowl finalist spot during the game.  A few weeks ago it was announced that Fritolay/Pepsi had bought a 7th Super Bowl slot.  The company can use it for any of their products and I’ve read that they might run an ad for Brisk Ice Tea.  But, they may also decide to run one extra CTSB commercial.  I don’t think that’s gonna happen though.  6 CTSB ads is enough for one night.

Just for the record, the ads that I don’t think are going to air are Elevator Girl, Adam & Eve, Birthday Wish and First Date.  You can watch all 10 of this year’s finalists .

And now, a few quick predictions about the USA Today Ad Meter:

1.  Fritolay’s 5 million bucks is safe.  There is just no way in the world that 3 of this year’s finalists will be ranked the #1, #2 and #3 commercials of the game.

2.  Actually, all of Fritolay’s bonus money is probably safe.  I don’t think any of the Pepsi Max or Doritos commercials will land in the Top 3. (other companies have some really big ads planned for this year)

3.  The winner of the “Professional Commercial” gig will be the director of Pug Attack since that ad will be the highest scoring CTSB commercial of the night.

4.  The only spots that have a shot at making the Top 10 are Pug Attack, Love Hurts and House Sitting.

5.  AT LEAST one Crash the Super Bowl ad will score BELOW #30 on the Ad Meter. And if some of the weaker ads air I think they have a chance of landing in the bottom 10.

Alright well, the time for predictions is finally over.  Check back here after the Super Bowl for all the final ad meter results!

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The 2011 Crash the Super Bowl finalists are revealed

Posted by Beardy on January 3rd, 2011

Sweet jumping Jesus! The Top 10 finalists for the 2011 Crash the Super Bowl contest were revealed a little after midnight last night and I absolutely could not believe the results when I saw them. I mean literally, I did NOT believe the results I was looking at. The reveal was scheduled to happen at exactly 12AM but when I checked the site at ten after, the finalists had yet to be posted. I checked again a few minutes later and the site was blank. So when the 10 finalists finally appeared I honestly thought that there had been some kind of glitch or something and several random videos were being used to fill some of the the finalist slots. I know it must sound like I’m joking but I’m not. The results of this contest are just simply that unbelievably disappointing.

I’ve been looking forward to the reveal of the CTSB finals videos for weeks, not because I thought I might win but because I love watching great video contest entries. And until now, the Crash the Super Bowl finalist videos tended to be some of the best, funniest, most cleaver, most memorable commercials of the year. (Just a few days ago I was at a New Year’s Party and I heard someone say “Keep your hands off my momma, keep your hands off my Doritos!”)  But the 2011 batch of finalists are just so…so…lame. All of the finalist ads are ok, and a few are even pretty good but most of them range from annoying to mediocre.  And one of them probably should have even been disqualified for violating the rules.

On Saturday I posted my predictions for the Top 5 Pepsi Max ads and it turns out I was way, way off.  I got 1 out of 5 correct (Love Hurts.) One other ad, “Torpedo Cooler” made my Top 30 list. The other 3 finalists did make my unofficial “decent entries” list (I bookmarked every entry I saw that was at least ok) but I never, NEVER would have excepted to see some of these spots make the Top 5. There were just SO MANY BETTER ADS submitted I cannot comprehend what led Doritos and Pepsi to make some of these choices.

One of my other predictions did come true though and it came true in a BIG way. I predicted that this year, the CTSB judges would be looking for commercials that did not look as professional as past finalist videos. I predicted they’d be looking for stuff that seemed more home-made and was maybe even rough around the edges. And let me tell you, some of these finalist videos are pretty rough! I love that Fritolay is willing to give videos of low production quality a shot but I expected the ads to also be funny! If a video looks bad and sounds bad and isn’t funny or interesting, then it’s just a bad ad. I would much rather see 10 super slick but funny ads dominate the Top 10.

By now you’ve probably watched all Top finalist videos for yourself.  But I’m going to give each spot a brief review.  I’ll be scoring each ad on a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 being a total embarrassment and 10 being one of the best commercials of the year.  Click the images to watch the ad on the CTSB site.  Here are the Doritos ads first followed by the Pepsi Max ads:

ADAM EVE. VCN’s score:  5/10. This is one of the coolest commercials for apples I have ever seen.  Too bad it’s supposed to be an ad for Doritos.  It’s hard to tell since the chips don’t appear until the very end.  The ad looks gorgeous and the girl is crazy hot but the pay off is a total groaner.  After the chips are revealed I half expected to hear that ironic, anti-climactic trumpet sound.  You know…waww waaaaaaw.  Is this ad really special enough to air in front of 100 million people on Super Bowl sunday? Chances on the Ad Meter: LOW.  Except for the pretty CG background and the “naked” girl, there is nothing going on here that would cause viewers to crank their dials to “like.”  In fact, it might even offend some of the more religious members of the Ad Meter focus group.

BIRTHDAY WISH. VCN’s score:  6/10.  Birthday Wish is one of the best of the Top 10 and it was directed by 2010 Crash the Super Bowl finalist Kevin Willson.  Last year his ad “” played during the Super Bowl but didn’t crack the Top 10 on the ad meter.  Though this spot is funny, I believe that it probably is in violation of the official rules of the contest and should have been disqualified.  The rules state that all sound effects must be original.  This ad is filled with sound effects and I swear I recognize several of them.   The first time the kids all yell “yayyy!” sounds like a popular stock sound and I KNOW I have heard those robot noises before.  I think they come from an old robot toy.  So the sound guy may have recorded the sound from the toy but it’s still copyright infringement if he did. Jan 5 UPDATE: I’m lowering the score for this ad from 8/10 to 6/10.  I was so distracted by the lack of quality in some of the other finalist videos that I let the slickness of this ad distract me from it’s content.  Re-watching it I realize that the product it is meant to advertise, Doritos only get about 3 SECONDS of quality screen time.  This contest isn’t a film festival. The selected ads still have to sell some chips.  Chances on the ad meter: GOOD.  The ad is funny and interesting all the way through though it lacks a big punchline.  I can see this making the top 5 but not the top 3.

HOUSE SITTING. VCN’s score: 6/10. I can sum up my reaction to this spot in three letters W…T…F?  The ad is well made and nicely paced but it just gives me the heebie jeebies.  There’s just something creepy about a cremated old man coming back from the dead.  And the circumstances of this spot are pretty weird.  For one thing, why would a “grandson” have his grandfather’s ashes?  Did none of grandpa’s children want them?  And how many 25 year old’s have you ever met that keep someone’s ashes on their mantle?  One last question, how will this ad make anyone want to buy or eat Doritos?  Chances on the ad meter: MODERATE.  This is not an ad that anyone is going to love but the “happy ending” would keep it from sinking too low in the rankings.

PUG ATTACK. VCN’s score:  4/10.  I liked this ad a lot better the first time I saw it…when it was called Underdog.  I means seriously Fritolay, you picked another finalist ad about a guy who tries to torture a cute dog by offering him Doritos?  At least last year’s dog-centric finalist video was clever and wacky.  This ad is just drawn out and predictable.  And I think viewers are going to remember and realize this is probably a rip-off. (seriously, click that link to compare them)  The people who made it had to have been trying to do their own version of that ad, probably because Underdog did so well on the ad meter last year.  I mean the ad even ends with the dog eating from the bag on the ground just like in Underdog.  Chances on the Ad Meter: LOW TO MODERATE.  The dog is cute but the ad is soooo drawn out.  Viewers will get bored before the punchline comes.  I’d expect it to rank at about #17.

THE BEST PART. VCN’s score:  7/10. Do people watching the super bowl really want to see one man suck orange “cheese” off the fingers of another man?  No…probably not.  The lead actor’s performance is funny but the character is kind of a rip off of the characters that comedian Nick Swardson does.  Jan 4th UPDATE: The phrase “Mmmm, Cheese!” has been stuck in my head since yesterday and I’ve actually chuckled to myself as I recalled the ad.  That says A LOT about the effectiveness of this commercial.  Chances on the ad meter: MODERATE.  “Hey, is that Mclovin in that ad!?  I think it is!!”  That’s how a lot of people are going to react when they first see this commercial.  No, that’s McLovin from SuperBad.  But if viewers THINK that’s Mclovin they might actually score the ad higher just because they like seeing that guy.  But the unappetizing finger and pants licking could turn off a number of ad meter viewers.

ELEVATOR GIRL. VCN’s Score:  2/10. This spot will probably forever have the distinction of being the worst Crash the Super Bowl finalist ever. It is so appallingly bad that you have to wonder if it was made by the son of some big shot at PepsiCo.  The jokes and performances are as bland as the visuals.  A plain white elevator?  That’s supposed to catch viewer’s eyes during the Super Bowl?  And the “punchline” is so lame and so poorly delivered that my immediate reaction was “is that it!?”  This entry isn’t even good enough to play at 2am on Nick at Night let alone the Super Bowl.  Chances on the Ad Meter: NONE.  There is no way in the world the Pepsi judges could think this spot would ever make the Top 3 on the ad meter.  This pick is so suspiciously bad that I can’t help but wonder if they are trying to tank this contest on purpose.

FIRST DATE.  VCN’s Score:  5/10. Personally, I like this one but I don’t think it’s right for such a high profile contest.  I remember thinking this ad was cute and funny when I first saw it but is this really a Super Bowl commercial?  If it plays during the big game are people going to want to watch it again later on youtube?  Are they going to want to tweet the link or post it on their facebook pages?  Would anyone even remember this ad by the end of the game?  Chances on the Ad Meter. LOW.  The low production values and lack of action will turn off most viewers right from the start.  It does start to get funnier as it goes on but the whole ad is just too low-key to make an impression on focus group viewers.

LOVE HURTS.  VCN’s Score:  9/10. This is the best finalist of the entire Top 10.  It’s funny all the way through and it actually tells you why you should drink Pepsi Max; it tastes good but it also has zero calories.  But the best thing about this ad is that it features a classic Crash the Super Bowl surprise at the end.  Chances on the Ad Meter: HIGH.  If any CTSB ad has a chance of making the Top 3 this year it’s this one….but I don’t think it will.  Let’s be realistic here; the ad features an African American woman assaulting a pretty blond white girl.  Some folks are going to be offended by that.  Those people will be idiots but there are a lot of idiots in this country.

TORPEDO COOLER.  VCN’s Score: 8/10. This is the best ad of the bunch after Love Hurts.  It was directed by 2010 CTSB finalist Brendon Haywood.  Brendon’s ad didn’t wind up airing during the Super Bowl.  Since one team of finalists actually got two ads in the Top 6 last year, Brendon was the only guy in the contest who didn’t get to see one of his commercials air during the big game.  I remember getting the feeling that the other finalists and the Fritlay folks felt really bad for the guy since he was the only “non-winner.”  Like I said, this is a good ad and it made my Top 30 list.  But could this choice be Fritolay’s way of giving a nice guy a second shot at the bigtime?  Chances on the ad meter: MODERATE TO GOOD.  This is a funny ad that looks great and has some cool effects in it.  I can see this spot making the Top 10 on the ad meter.

ZERO CALORIES?  PSSSHT! VCN’s Score:  4/10. Psssht indeed!  What the F%*& is this video doing in the Top 10!?  More than 1400 commercials were submitted to this contest.  Is this really one of the best??  The only reason I can think of that this ad made it is because it features all women it was submitted by someone named BrandyGill74.  In all the years the Crash the Super Bowl contest has been run there has never been one, single female finalist.  Fritolay knew that was unacceptable and I think they decided there had to be a female director included in the top 10.  And “BrandyGill74” sounds like the screen name of a 36 year old female director.  Seriously, that’s the only explanation that makes any sense.  This commercial is simply annoying as hell.  The sound isn’t even any good.  It’s not fit for TV.  UPDATE: Turns out “Brandy Gill” is a guy.”  I think his name really might have helped his chances though.  Chances on the Ad Meter: NONE TO LOW.  Who could like this?  Seriously, who?  Does Pepsi think it will appeal to women?  Because I think most women will see this and just think that’s one group of weird white ladies.

Ok, now I know I’ve been pretty harsh on some of these ads but I want to stop and take a moment to offer my congratulations to all the finalists.  No, seriously!  I mean it.  We have a rule here at Video Contest News; don’t hate the player, hate the game.  You can’t blame anyone for winning a video contest fair and square.  Judges sometimes make idiotic decisions but it’s not the filmmaker’s fault.  Some of this year’s finalists got incredibly lucky and I’m sure they know it.  So good for them for pulling off a win.  I can’t say that I’m not jealous.

But I also can’t say that I’m not pissed.  Something seriously wrong has happened here.  Pepsi and Doritos snubbed hundreds of decent ads in favor of some incredibly lame videos.  And this isn’t sore loser talk.  I think the general public and marketing professionals are going to be stunned when they see the ads that Fritolay and their consultants at Goodby/Silverstein selected to represent their brands.  Goodby/Silverstein is a very big and respected ad agency.  How could they let their clients make such awful choices?  If a spot like “Elevator Girl” winds up playing during the Super Bowl it will be a major embarrassment for everyone involved.  Hell, it will be a major embarrassment for people who are not involved like YOU and ME!  I think the most troubling thing about these results is that if companies think these 10 finalists are the “best” that we “little guys” can come up with, the video contest/user-generated ad  phenomenon might be in serious trouble.

So, what do YOU think of the 2011 Crash the Superbowl finalists?  Speak your mind in the comment section!

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Our Top 5 Pepsi-Max CTSB Predictions

Posted by Beardy on January 1st, 2011

I see nut-shots in your future

Hey folks, Happy New year!  For you, the reader it’s now 2011 but I’m sending these words to you from the distant past!  Well, Wednesday, December 29th, 2010 to be precise.  I figure I’ll be in no condition to blog on New Year’s Day so I’m writing this article now and setting it to “auto-post” on January 1st.  So if you can read this it means the power grids didn’t fail and my predictions about Y2K+10 were totally off base.

And speaking of (probably) inaccurate predictions…as I’ve explained in previous posts, I gave myself a Crash The Super Bowl related challenge this year.  I set out to watch all 1460+ Pepsi Max submissions and then list the videos that I thought had the best chance of making it to the Top 5.  I called it my Top 30 contenders list.  After I posted the list most readers had one of two reactions; 1.  Why didn’t my entry make your list!? and 2. That’s great but where’s your Top 5?

My response to Question #1 was usually something along the lines of “well, there were lots of great entries and just because I don’t think your submission fits precisely with what I suspect the Pepsi Max folks will be looking for it doesn’t mean your entry isn’t any good.”  And my response to Question #2 was pretty much “Meh, I don’t feel like doing one.”

But since the official reveal of the 2011 Crash the Super bowl finalists is now just 2 days away I couldn’t help but compiling a last minute list of predictions.  I only watched a handful of Doritos entries this year so I’m going to guess all 5 Doritos finalists will be new to me.  But like I said I did watch every, single Pepsi Max submission.  So here are the 5 ads that I think have a shot at going all the way.  I’ll present them in the most exciting order known to man; ALPHABETICAL!   Click the images to see the videos at Crashthesuperbowl.com.

"Holy Sugar-free!"

LAUNCH PAD. This is just an amazing looking entry.  I’d say it was the best produced Pepsi Max ad I watched.  However…there is a chance this ad may be TOO professional looking for this competition.  If this spot aired on TV no one would ever suspect it was an entry in a “User-Generated” commercial contest.  And I think this year Pepsi and Doritos will be looking for ads with a low-budget, homemade feel.  “Launch Pad” was actually created by a team of filmmakers named Dandy Dwarves.  Their entry “Too Delicious” made the Doritos Crash the Super Bowl finals in 2008/2009.  Last year they submitted an AMAZING entry called Doritos Please that I thought for sure was  bound for the 2010 finals.  But it didn’t make it.  And I think one reason “Doritos Please” didn’t make it is because the ad was TOO professional looking.   So, in this contest, too slick might actually be a negative.

"Maximum Taste!"

LOVE HURTS. This is one of the only submissions that actually made me laugh out loud.  It’s kind of ingenious in the way it builds to its big payoff.  For the first 20 seconds you think you’re just watching a typical “wife wants husband to eat right” commercial.  But then at the end a shocking moment of slapstick takes you by surprise.  Oh, plus the main guy gets a pie in the face!  On top of that, the production values are top notch and the casting is great.  And this ad does have one other big thing going for it; the main characters are not just a couple of 25 year old white guys.  Diversity is important to big companies like Fritolay (as well it should be) and if they wind up picking 10 finalists that feature nothing but white people running around kicking each other in the nuts it’s not going to look good.  But even if you take diversity out of the equation, this ad is definitely Top 5 material.

"Aaaaaahhhhhhh!"

MAXIMUM BORGNINE. This is the prediction I have the most confidence in.  Every batch of Crash the Super Bowl finalists needs one “home run” in the group.  And Maximum Borgnine is one of the only potential home runs I saw among the 1400+ Pepsi Max entries I watched.  If there’s a Pepsi Max ad that has a shot at making the Top 3 on the ad meter, this is it.  Having said all that, I’ll be kind of disappointed if Maximum Borgnine makes the finals.  Yes, it’s a home run but not because it’s well written or incredibly hilarious.  The only reason that this ad is special in any way is because it has a celebrity in it.  Replace Earnest Borgnine with a random adorable old guy actor and it wouldn’t be very memorable.  But he is in there so the ad will be memorable.  (to be fair, if I saw this spot on TV and it wasn’t part of the CTSB contest, It’d make me smile because Ernest Borgnine is awesome.)  Long story short, I’m thinking Pepsi is going to hope that Earnest Borgnine will be the Betty White of the 2011 Super Bowl.  But if they do pick the ad they’re going to frustrate a lot of contestants who would didn’t realize that getting a celebrity was a shortcut to the finals.

TP'in...Throwin Pepsi...MAX

THROWING PEPSI. If you’re going to give “Average joes” from  the middle of nowhere a chance to make it big it’s a good idea to pick at least one ad that feels like it was made by actual average joes.  One of my past criticisms of the Crash the Super Bowl contest is that they seem to prefer really slickly made videos.  Production values ARE important but if Fritolay just picks a bunch of ads that were made by pros from LA, it kind of takes the fun out of the endeavor.   So I think Pepsi and Doritos will each be picking at least one non-professional looking finalist entry this year.  And for Pepsi Max I think the choice will be “Throwing Pepsi.” This ad is one of my personal favorites and I’ll be rooting for it to make the finals.  I think it perfectly captures the sought-after “user-generated” quirkiness and look.  It was shot in a random suburb, somewhere in America by two “average joes.”  It features tons of small but funny gags (like young guys in intentionally bad old guy costumes) and it has several big gags that will make viewers laugh out loud.  But I think the best thing about Throwing Pepsi is the goofy dude with the shaved head.  If this ad airs during the super bowl, THAT GUY could be the Betty White of 2011.

"I love Tool Fights!"

TOOL FIGHT. This is an amusing spot and it certainly looks like a Super Bowl ad.  Plus Pepsi Max is supposed to be the “manly” alternative to Diet Pepsi and this spot is all about over-the-top manliness.  But when I first made my list of Top 30 Pepsi Max contenders I included “Tool Fight” but said that certain factors would probably keep it out of the finals.  This spot was created by a team of filmmakers named “The Herbert Brothers.”  If you entered the CTSB contest I’m sure you know who they are.  They’ve made the Crash the Super Bow finals twice and in 2009 their hilarious ad scored #1 on the USA Today Ad meter and won the brothers a one million dollar bonus….as well as a ton of press coverage.  Since their win, the brothers have been enlisted by Fritolay several times to promote the Crash the Super Bowl and they were even hired to create the official “How to Crash” instructional videos that are up at Crashthesuperbowl.com.  So my thinking is that even though “Tool Fight” is good, Fritloay just would not be able to pick it because 6,000 contestants would all flip out over the choice.  But since I posted my list I started thinking about this from Pepsi’s point of view.  To them, these negatives might be positives.  If the former CTSB champs come back to compete again, that’s an interesting news story.  If “Tool Fight” does make the Top 5, expect to see articles and press releases that say things like “The Kings of the Crash are back but this time, they’ve got their sights set on a new product; Pepsi max!“  I think the added press coverage that would come with “Tool Fight“ will be just too good for Pepsi to turn down.

And finally, I do have one more prediction; I predict that at least 3 of my 5 predictions will be wrong!  Seriously though, I wouldn’t be surprised if I wind up going 0 for 5.  And ok…I ‘ll throw in one Doritos prediction; a few readers sent me a link to a video entitled Aardvark and I think it’ll probably make it.

So, that’s it for the predictions.  The real finalists will be announced on January 2nd at 12:01AM.  We’ll have reviews of all 10 finalist ads on Monday ’cause Beardy is hardcore like that.  Be sure to stop by the Site on January 2nd and let us know what you think of Fritolay’s top 10.

Oh!  One more thing; I’ve heard from a ton of readers in the last few weeks that submitted some really awesome entries for this contest.  If you’re a fan of this site and you actually make the Top 10 let me know and VCN will help promote your spot during the month-long voting process!

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When will the Crash the Super Bowl finalists be notified?

Posted by Beardy on December 16th, 2010

It’s been just over a month since the deadline for the Crash the Super Bowl contest passed so if you’re one of the 6,000 or so people who entered this year, right about now you’re probably wondering when the 5 Pepsi Max and 5 Doritos finalists will be told they made the top 10. The finalists will officially be revealed on Monday, January 3rd (sounds like this might happen right at midnight) and voting for the ads that will air during the super bowl will start immediately.  But since finalists will need to submit a ton of paperwork before their ads can be cleared for use, the producers of those ads will need time to get all that stuff together.  And this year, finalists will be allowed to make some small tweaks to their entries so that will take some time too.

According the the moderator on the Crash the Super Bowl website, this year’s finalists have NOT yet been notified (as of December 14th) but Fritolay won’t say exactly when the notifications will take place.  But I’ve talked to a number of past CTSB finalists and it sounds like every year Doritos contacts the finalists just before Christmas. So if you haven’t heard anything yet you can continue to hold out hope for about another week.  But if you don’t get an e-mail or phone call by the end of business on the 23rd you might want to start making other plans for the Super Bowl.

DECEMBER 20th UPDATE: A few people on the crash the super bowl site noticed that someone left this comment on a doritos video called “Picking Teams:”

“Heard the word that you guys were contacted in a blog! Thats awesome! COngrats guys.. This spot def deserved it!”  (link)

But the CTSB forum moderator was asked about this and said that the finalists have NOT YET been notified.

DECEMBER 20th UPDATE #2: Some knucklehead using the screen name “TheTop10″ is posting a bunch of comments on different, popular entries on the Crash the Super Bowl site saying that “according to Video Contest News” the finalists have already been notified.  For the record, we have NOT claimed that the finalists have been notified.  In fact, I believe the forum moderator when he said that the finalists have not been contacted yet.  I do suspect that “Picking Teams” is a finalist video though and that word did slip out about that one.  But I think they were contacted early for some special reason and the rest of the finalists will probably be contacted in the next few days.

DECEMBER 21st UPDATE: A finalist from last year’s Crash the Super Bowl contest posted a comment today and he explained how and when he got the good news last year.  I’ll let him remain anonymous but I can confirm that he definitely was a finalist last year.  So check out the comments to get the inside story!

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