Super Bowl XLIV just ended and that means that the 2010 installment of Doritos’ Crash the Super Bowl contest is finally over too. All three winning commercials aired in the first quarter but SURPRISE!…Doritos snuck one more Crash the Superbowl finalist in during the 4th quarter. And holy crap, the USA Today Ad Meter results have just come in and SURPRISE again! One of the Crash the Superbowl ads cracked the top 3! I’ll post all the numbers below but first here are the official winners in the order they ran. From what I’ve read, the order that the commercials aired reflect which entries got the most, second most and third most votes last month.
1. Underdog. Created by Nick Dimondi/Joshua Svoboda
2. House Rules. Created by Joelle de Jesus
3. Casket. Created by Kevin T. Willson
SURPRISE BONUS AD. Snack Attack Samurai. Created by Ben Krueger
A few days ago I explained here and here that it looked like Doritos had already revealed the names of the Crash the Super Bowl entries that were going to air tonight. The finalist entries that were publicly identified as destined for air last week were Snack Attack Samurai, Kids These Days and Casket. Looks like those predictions were off by one. But hey, way back in December, before the finalists were even announced, we predicted in this post that “Underdog” would go all the way this year. So hurray for us!
UPDATE: Oh snap!!!! The Ad Meter results are in and UNDERDOG was rated the second best commercial of the entire game right after the Betty White/Snickers spot! That means the makers of Underdog, 5 Points Productions will be receiving a $600,000 bonus from Doritos. As for the other three Crash the Super Bowl entries that aired tonight….well, they didn’t fare so well. None of them even cracked the top 10. Here are the numbers.
1. Underdog. Ad Meter Score: 8.27. Ad Meter Rank: #2
2. House Rules. Ad Meter Score: 7.12. Ad Meter Rank: #11
3. Casket. Ad Meter Score: 7.00. Ad Meter Rank: #14
4. Snack Attack Samurai. Ad Meter Score: 6.79. Rank: #17
Now even though none of the other ads made the top 3, the scores are still quite impressive. After all, there were 60 commercials ranked by the ad meter. Plus since Snack Attack Samurai aired so late in the game I bet its score suffered because the focus groups in the Ad Meter polling were probably a little burnt out by then. You can see the full list of ad meter results here: USA Today Ad Meter.
So what did we learn tonight? Well, we learned that Beardy is a genius! We totally called this one. Over the last few weeks we’ve repeatedly claimed that “Underdog” was going to make it to the top three and not only that, we predicted that it was the only one of the six finalists that had a chance of doing so.
Seriously though, now that the dust is settling it’s clear that the big winner of the 2010 installment of the CTSB contest is 5 Points Productions. Though the Crash the Super Bowl contest has only been run three times, that plucky team of filmmakers from North Carolina have now won the competition TWICE! The 5 Points entry “Live the Flavor” won the first installment of the CTSB contest and aired during the 2007 Super Bowl. Now their entry “Underdog” has also came out on top. Plus they were the first filmmakers ever to get TWO entries in the finals in one year!! (The other was Kids These Days) That’s three unbelievable achievements so it looks like Doritos should get ready to crown them as the new, “Kings of the Crash.” They’ve earned it.
Yesterday I explained that on Wednesday night, CBS seemed to reveal 2 of the 3 winners of the Crash the Superbowl contest in their special “The Superbowl’s Greatest commercials.” Near the end of the show they featured a montage of new commercials explaining it was a “sneak peek” of ads that were going to air during the big game on Sunday. Two of the commercials in the montage were Crash the Superbowl finalists: Snack Attack Samurai and Kids These Days.
One of the most interesting things about the Doritos contest is that no one, not even the finalists are supposed to know who won until the three winning ads appear on TV during the Superbowl. However, the 6 videos that made it to the finals were also supposed to be kept secret but USA Today revealed one finalist (“Casket”) early in a story about Superbowl ad sales. So it seems that Doritos may be trying to milk the CTSB contest for all its worth by seizing every media opportunity that is presented to them, even if they have to share a few secrets to ensure coverage.
Possible case in point, I saw this really weird article from of all places, the Sacramento Bee. The piece is about a local actor and in the article they repeatedly assert that Casket WILL be airing on Superbowl Sunday. They even go so far as to say when “Casket” will air. Here’s some of the piece:
“Rocklin High School grad and actor Nick Armstrong has a lot riding on Sunday’s Super Bowl.
The Sacramento native will appear in a Doritos commercial that’s scheduled to air sometime before the halftime show. It’s one of three Doritos commercials competing in the chip company’s “Crash the Super Bowl” contest, and the most popular will win $1 million.
Four thousand commercials were submitted to Doritos, and three of them – including “Casket,” which features Armstrong – will be broadcast Sunday. USA Today’s Super Bowl Ad Meter – a survey of television ads conducted as a live poll during the telecast – will determine the most popular.
Besides the $1 million for first place, Doritos will pay the second-place finisher $600,000 and the third-place finisher $400,000.”
Notice what was missing from that article? The “ifs,” and “maybes.” The paper wrote about “Casket” like it was a done deal. So does the Sacramento Bee know something we don’t? Ehhh, maybe not. This article does have one red flag in it; the author seems to imply that the 3 Doritos commercials that air will receive a cash prize even if they don’t make the Top 3 on the USA Today ad meter. It seems like they got their facts mixed up. So maybe they got the rest of the facts mixed up too? It’s a tough call, the author really makes it sounds like he’s privy to some inside information.
Last spring, Taxslayer.com befuddled many a video contestant when they awarded first place and $25,000 in their annual Taxslayer commercial contest to frequent contest winner, HappyJoel Levinson. Here’s his winning entry:
The other contestants were befuddled because well….that’s a really weird video! It’s funny but obviously it wasn’t something taxslayer could actually put on tv. And that’s why so many of the other contestants were confused. The year before, Taxslayer aired the winning entry as-is. (click here to watch it) So contestants assumed that Taxslayer would be doing that again and many of them sunk a lot of time, money and production values into their submissions. I actually entered this contest and it was my first video contest loss. (winning was pretty easy back in 2007 and 2008.) In the days after Happyjoel’s video was picked I followed the reaction and let me tell you, people were PISSED. I’ve seen a lot of angry youtube comments in my day but damn, the other contestants flipped the fuck out.
Taxslayer explained that what they liked about Happyjoel’s video was the idea and they weren’t actually going to air the commercial. Instead, they were going to have professionals re-shoot it. I only spent about 80 bucks on my entry but I remember some really slick submissions. (here’s the one I was positive was going to win) If Taxslayer had let everyone know they were looking for “ideas” and not ready-for-tv ads, they would have saved a lot of filmmakers a lot of money.
Fast forward to tax season 2010. Happyjoel’s re-made video has finally hit the airwaves:
I’m glad that happyjoel actually got to play the part he created in his contest entry. But you know what? I think I prefer the original version. The (somewhat) fancy re-make is a bit stiff and the orginal was watchable because of how super weird it was.
Speaking of super weird, Taxslayer apparently decided to re-shoot a second entry from the 2009 contest. Here’s the re-make:
Yeah…that was pretty lame. But the weirdness deepens. Check out the entry that commercial was based on:
The orginal was funnier and more interesting than the remake! Whoever posted the re-shot version to youtube added this note: “Tax Slayer 60 second spot. This commercial was derived from contest creative. The spot was toned down to not look like an abduction, but rather a spoiled brat not wanting to conform.”
I cannot for the life of me figure out why Taxslayer chose that ad to remake or why they turned it into something that was thoroughly not funny. Whoever wrote that remake forgot the oldest rule in comedy; abduction victims are way more hilarious than spoiled brats.
As I said yesterday, if Crash the Superbowl was your first video contest experience, it shouldn’t be your last. Giant piles of money are just sitting out there on the web waiting to be claimed by any filmmaker willing to put in a little time and effort. I was stunned by the level of quality I saw in some of this year’s Doritos entries. If many of the filmmakers who participated in The Crash were to recycle their Doritos ideas for other video contests they’d walk away with plenty of big prizes.
Smaller money contests are definitely worth your time and energy because they are way, way easier to WIN than the big-money, high-profile competitions. Recently, a company called AMC technology held a video contest to promote their “Solutions for the Call Center” services. Because the company required that a lot of specific, technical info be included in the entries, only about 7 people entered. But AMC gave out three prizes: $2,500, 1,500 and $1,000. So anyone who entered at almost a 50% chance of winning some cash.
The theme of the contest was to show how AMC could help a business during the hectic holiday season. Here’s the winner:
First Place. Prize: $2,500.
Heh, heh. Guess what? That was my entry! Last year me and a friend went to a pub crawl called “SantaCon” where everyone dressed as Santas. So I had access to several santa suits. I bought one more, paid a few extras 30 bucks each to put the suits on and march around an office and kerblamo….2,500 bucks. The writing was tough because of all the tech-talk but the shoot only took about 2 hours. Editing probably took three. Max I put 15 hours into this. Tally all that up and I made $166 per hour (pre-tax.) Not to shabby. About a week and a half ago, I found out I won 3,500 in another contest so 2010 is only 8 days old and I’ve already got 6 Grand in checks coming to me thanks to video-contesting. So if you’re one of the 4,000 people who didn’t make it to the Crash the superbowl finals, quick feeling sorry for yourselves and making anti-Doritos facebook pages. Grab your camera and find a contest that is a little easier to win.
Here’s a bit of advice you would do well to heed; never enter a video contest that is being advertised on a billboard. If you’re serious about winning contests, avoid the high-profile stuff and concentrate on winning the contests that only 9 people enter.
As much as I love Chipotle, I knew I should resist the temptation to enter their “My Chipotle” video contest since they’d probably recived thousands of entries. (they did) To enter the contest you were supposed to create a video explaining what your personal, favorite taco or burrito is. (Mine: Chicken burrito with black beans, medium hot salsa, rice, cheese and a smidge of sour cream.) The winners of the contest were announced like 2 months ago but since I actually considered entering this one, I was curious to see who eventually won. And here’s who did. First place was $10,000: http://mychipotle.com/#/view_submission/63673
I ‘d embed the video but it wants to just start playing on its own. I hate when websites do that so I won’t do it to you. Another musical entry took second prize which was $5,000 and a Chipotle party for 50 people. Wowza. http://mychipotle.com/#/view_submission/63773
I sort of love the first place winning video a lot. But the second place video is yet another Andy Sandburg comedy-rap rip off. There seems to be one of those in every big-money video contest. This one is especially annoying thanks to the creepy kid doing the rapping.
Anyway, wow. I swear to God….I am going to try and get to a chipotle as soon as possible. I need a burrito, STAT.
I haven’t been spending much time working on this blog because Beardy has been hard at work making his own entry for the Doritos Crash the Superbowl contest. The thing is pretty much done I think so hopefully I’ll be able to upload it this weekend.
With just 2 days to go before the deadline, more than 1,000 entries have been submitted and some really high quality entries have been coming in. The production values have gone through the roof in the last week but that was expected. I’ve seen a good number of entries that, if they were shot for a different video contest, would win easily. But…I only seen one, really, REALLY great entry so far and I suspect that it won’t even make the finals. If I had to pick 6 videos that were going to make it to the finals, I bet I’d get 4 of them wrong.
As I said, the videos are getting better but I think most people are missing the true point of the contest: To get a top spot on the USA Today ad meter. That means a perfect video would appeal to as many people as possible. But I’ve been seeing tons of good videos that would turn off a large portion of the audience. Dudes might love watching chip crumbs fall down the cleavage of a beautiful woman, but are women going to score that high on the ad meter? And sure, some people might thing liking doritos dust off of a sleeping dog is ingenious but that will just completely gross out some people. The thing that amazes me the most though is the amount of violence against women I’ve been seeing in the videos. Ok, a shot of one girl tackling another if one thing but I have seen many good videos ruined by shots of women getting hit, tackled, and even punched in the face in realistic ways by MEN. Doritos might be looking for edgy spots but there are some lines that just shouldn’t be crossed.
This might be a little late to help anyone who plans to enter the contest this year but let’s take a look back at the kind of videos Dortitios DOES like. Here are ALL the finalists from the two previous years that Dortios held the Crash the Superbowl commercial contest.
2007 Finalists
Aired During the Superbowl:
Aired During the Superbowl:
2009 Finalists
Aired During the Superbowl and won a million bucks:
It always warms my cockles to see a really great video win a big prize in a contest. Last week, Baskin Robbins announced the winners of their “Ice Cream and Cake” Dance video contest and my cockles couldn’t be any happier. The idea of the contest was that you were supposed to shoot a video of yourself dancing to the new (and apparently “Peanut butter Jelly Time” inspired) Ice Cream and Cake song.
There was a lot of cash at stake in this one: first place was $10K, second was $5K and third was $1K. Oh, and all the winners got some ice cream cakes too! First place got a thousand dollars worth. Damn….that’s a lot of frickin’ ice cream cake. But as you’ll see, I’m sure they can put it to good use. First place went to a video that was shot by like an entire dance academy of kids. Not only is it over the top and well-choreographed, the production quality is top notch. Whoever shot that was really smart. Instead of just setting the camera to shoot a wide shot of all the action they added tons of charisma and fun to the video by actually getting close-ups of the dancing kid’s faces.
You can see all three winning videos here:
The video that took third is one of the WEIRDEST video contest entries I have ever seen. It looks like it could be a comedy sketch shot for the Andy Milonakis show. Do yourself a favor and check it out. It’ll make you wonder how the heck those two people know each other. My question is, who knew it would be hilarious to film them having a baskin and robbins adventure together?
There are only 18 days left to enter the Doritos Crash the Superbowlcommercial contest. But if you’re visiting this site, you probably already know that. And if you know exactly when the Crash the Superbowl deadline is then I bet you certainly know who Joe and Dave Herbert are. They are the dudes that you aspire to be!
Last year, the Herbert Brother’s commercial “Free Doritos” not only won the Crash the Superbowl competition, it went on to be ranked the #1 best spot of the entire game by the USA Today Ad Meter. That amazing feat earned them a million dollar bonus from Doritos…and lots of jealousy from ad execs on Madison avenue.
With a single win, Joe and Dave Herbert became the biggest video contest winners of all time. If this site had a hall of fame, they’d be the first inductees. Since their big win the brothers from Indiana have made the most out of the exposure they’ve gotten and have gone on to become for real, professional filmmakers. Now that’s a prize you can’t put a price tag on.
I had the opportunity to do an e-mail interview with the Herbert Brothers about their experiences and about the new installment of the Crash the Superbowl contest. They were insanely generous with their time and came back at me with some really awesome answers. If you’re planning on entering the Crash the Superbowl, or really, ANY video contest, READ THIS INTERVIEW! It’s filled with tips, strategies and nuggets of wisdom about HOW TO WIN.
———————————————————————————————————–
Guys, first off, thanks for taking the time to answer my questions. I hadn’t seen the Crash the superbowl finalists before the game last year but I was thrilled when I saw your commercial. Right away I knew that it had to be the winner of the Doritos contest and I also immediately knew that it was hands down the best commercial of the game. The impact of your million dollar win has just been enormous. This time last year, filmmakers had to scour the web looking for video contests to enter. Today, video contests are such a hot marketing tool that there are too many to even keep track of. And I know that if your spot hadn’t ranked number 1 on the ad meter, contests would be nowhere near as popular as they are now. So everybody enters and wins video contests really owe you. Ok, now for the questions:
VCN: You guys seem to have gone through a lot of trouble to shoot your commercial. How difficult was it to get everything you needed for the spot?
DAVE: Great question and the answer is that it was both difficult and easy-as-pie all at the same time. My biggest concern when we finally committed to the idea was getting our hands on a vending machine that we could destroy…and do it on our pea sly budget. The only place we looked was EBAY. We bought a nicer looking piece of junk for $400 and were in business. The next thing we needed to obtain were pieces of glass that we could put into the machine that would explode on impact. We looked into glass that would break with the kind of explosiveness that we wanted. We ended up getting five panes of tempered glass made to the right dimensions for around-about total of $130. The last big prop that we needed to figure out was the sno-globe. We needed a nice looking globe for close-ups, but one that was heavy enough to toss through the vending machine glass and light enough to hit a person in the jewels. What we did do was purchase a nice sno-globe for the close-ups. We used a duct-taped bocce ball to zing through the vending machine glass (which we did NO effects to in the spot – freeze frame the throw mid-air and you’ll see a perfectly round, duct-taped bocce ball). We wanted to do the entire last shot without cutting to make it look (and feel) more real so we used CGI and animation. The cast and crew were simple to get. Most of them we’ve worked with before, and the ones we haven’t worked with were excited to jump on board.
JOE: Before everything Dave talked about it was simply coming up with the right concept. When we do something, we put every effort into making whatever it is we do the best we can make it — and usually that involves a lot of research. Once we understood how the USA Today Ad Meter worked we began to generate ideas that we thought would give a wide audience (men, women, races, ages, etc.) reason to turn up their dials. We also did a study of previous winners – from what quarter they aired, to how long the commercial was, to what the subject matter was, etc. and looking at the top five ad meter finishes over the past 8 years gave us some good insight as to what works and what doesn’t. On the one hand I can say I’m not surprised we took the top spot because that’s actually what we set out to do — on the other hand we realize what an amazing feat it was to actually do what we set out to accomplish — which was seemingly impossible (even in our own minds).
Joe and Dave’s Million Dollar commercial:
VCN: Was there a point when you considered making something less complicated?
DAVE: No, but we did make two spots for the contest. Our other spot, NERDS, of course did not make the finals but you can view it from our website, http://www.herbertbrothers.com. When they announced the contest we both knew that FREE DORITOS was the idea to use. BUT, this was the first year that Doritos was offering the $1M bonus, so we did the homework and looked into what we needed to do to rank high on the USA Today Ad Meter and tailored the idea to work for Doritos AND score as high a ranking as possible.
JOE: I don’t believe we’ve done anything since birth to make things less complicated — not on ourselves, not on our parents, not on our wives, not on anyone. I hope one day to accomplish the complicated task of making a task less complicated. =)
The Herbert Brothers OTHER entry for the 2009 Crash the Superbowl competition:
VCN: Was this your first video contest experience?
DAVE: Our first video contest experience was in the original 2007 Doritos Crash the Super Bowl Contest. Niether Joe nor I are formally trained filmmakers. We weren’t professionals, we’ve never taken a film class. We had only just begun to learn about filmmaking by teaching ourselves and had just finished our first short film EVER just before that contest launched. We were looking for a new project to do and a friend had heard about it and we dicided to give it a try.
JOE: In 2008 we were super excited to enter our second competition – that being another shot at the super bowl with the Doritos Crash the Super Bowl ad contest. Sadly they changed it up on us making a contest for original music. Had we attempted making music, no amount of research in the world would have saved us from coming in dead last! 2009 Doritos had the contest again and this time it was for commercials again! And this time a million was up for grabs. And this time… well, you know the rest.
Joe and Dave’s 2007 Crash the Superbowl Finalist video: Doritos Duct Tape
VCN: If not, what other kind of competitions have you entered?
DAVE: Joe and I are not really contest kind of guys. We were definitely pursuing filmmaking as dream careers, but did not go hunting for every contest we could get into. Of course, as mentioned above, we entered the 2007 Doritos Crash the Super Bowl contest which was our first ever contest and we did quite well. We were gung-ho about entering the 2008 Crash, but Doritos ran it for musicians…and Joe and I are NOT musicians. When we found out that we couldn’t create a spot for the 2008 Crash we started looking for aother contest to enter and got into the Heinz 57 Top This TV Challenge. Nothing against Heinz or ketchup in general, but we never really got into that contest with as much enthusiasm as the Crash…but we wanted to shoot something. Those are the only video/commercial contests we’ve ever entered before winning the 2009 Crash.
JOE: Most of the competitions we enter are unwritten ones – that is to say the competitions we have amongst each other. Dave and I are the oldest of five boys. All of us are VERY COMPETITIVE in sports, jobs, dreams, you name it. In fact a few years ago, simply as a joke, we decided on a competition to determine who will be the most famous Herbert Brother – and that to determining factor was to be the first to appear on a late night talk show. So we can thank Doritos and Jay Leno for making Dave and I the winners of that contest!
VCN: How did you guys find out that your video was going to play during the Superbowl?
DAVE: The folks at Doritos like to give people ulcers so they don’t reveal the winner before hand. We found out the exact same time that everyone else in the world found out…once it aired! Doritos lines up all of the finalists in front of the TV to record the winners’ reactions as the winning spot airs. And since we were finalists in the first Crash in 2007 we’ve been in those seats before and lost. Joe and I both were disgusted by the thought of getting so close and losing again. I could barely take it! I had such a sick feeling going into it all of the way up until the excitement of actually winning. The whole experience is emotional torture but, win or lose, is such a wild ride that you want to get on again and again…it’s addictive. And I have to say that, although the folks at Doritos love to watch the finalists squirm and give them ulcers, they sure make it a lot of fun. It is hands down the BEST video/commercial contest on the planet!
JOE: It’s funny when you watch the reaction video. Everyone comments on the reaction AFTER we see our commercial air, but few notice the expressions leading up to it. Because Dave and I have been there and lost before it wasn’t enough just to be there this time… and when you see the five finalists the other four are on the edge of their seats, eyes wide open in anticipation, with huge grins on their faces — meanwhile, I’m leaned back in my chair with my arms crossed just sitting there will no real expression whatsoever. It’s funny to look back on that.
DAVE: Yes, of course! Part of being a finalist is getting an all expenses paid WEEK LONG party that ends with going TO the game and watching it live from a luxury box!!!
JOE: And then when we returned our entire town of Batesville threw us a parade with the help of Doritos. The mayor gave us the key to the city, and the Governor gave us distinguished hoosier awards. It was a great party!
Dave and Joe and the Snowglobe and a whole lot of chips
VCN: How have your lives changed since the win?
DAVE: Joe and I began pursuing dreams of filmmaking for about 5 years before we won, but winning has become our “big break” into the industry. After winning we were able to sign with a commercial repping firm that represents us nationally for commercial work. We’ve also partnered with an Indianapolis production company to produce commercials with us and have had small businesses and multi-million dollar companies contact us directly about doing spots for them which we’ve been doing – both writing and directing. We can finally say that we are professional filmmakers! On top of all of that we’ve signed with a manager in Los Angeles that represents us for writing/directing feature films and have had introductory meetings with numerous studios including Fox, Dreamworks, MGM, Universal, Lakeshore, Funny or Die, Comedy Central, and many others! We have two screenplays that we’re currently developing. Needless to say we’ve been having a lot of fun with our new jobs which on top of filmmaking includes launching a board game that we’ve been developing for almost 10 years. We went into debt before the contest began to finally manufacture our game, TRIVIATHON, and winning the bonus prize of $1M has definitely relieved that financial stress – especially since neither Joe nor I had a “real” job at the time. You can check out TRIVIATHON, which itself has won some major awards in the industry including 2009 Creative Child Magazine GAME OF THE YEAR, etc., at http://www.triviathon.com.
JOE: While I can say without a doubt that YES it did change our lives I can also say without a doubt that it did NOT change us. We’ve had the pleasure of doing a lot of traveling as guest speakers at events all over the country and it amazes me how many people stop us afterward to point out how down to earth and genuine we are. We don’t do it on purpose, we just be ourselves, but I guess that’s the point, lol.
VCN: Aside from the money, what was the coolest thing to happen as a result of you winning the Crash the Superbowl challenge?
DAVE: Most people would probably be surprised to hear that the money WAS NOT even the coolest thing that has happened. I’m not motivated at all by money and it is not why we entered the contest. In fact, I haven’t really bought anything with the money and Joe hasn’t either. We gave around $90,000 to our team that volunteered and worked with us creating the spot, we’ve given a decent chunk to charity and are investing some of the winnings into an entrepreneurialy philanthropic adventure that we’ve had buzzing in our heads for the last few years… but aside from that have invested it into our board game and filmmaking careers. The experience itself is the real prize!!! You cannot buy it with all of the money in the world!!! The exposure that we’ve received and the lives that we’ve touched through the inspirational story that we’ve lived is as sweet as it gets! To chose one specific thing throughout the experience for me personally would be appearing as guests on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno. The rest of the exposure that we got was news, but Jay Leno is entertainment!!! News HAS to cover news worthy stories, but Jay Leno doesn’t have to have us on unless he wants to. Besides, three years prior, my four brothers and I agreed on a contest that would determine the “Most Famous Herbert Brother”…and that would be the first to appear as guest on a late night talk show! Joe and I won, but it was almost too easy only taking three years to accomplish. So we agreed to start the contest again and this time pick something a little harder. The winner of “Most Famous Herbert Brother” will now be determined by the first of us five to appear on the cover of a national magazine (bonus for being Time Magazine Man of the Year) -OR- have a road in a major city named after us. We like to have FUN!!!!
JOE: I agree with dave. I think the parade our town threw for us one of the coolest things. As part of the contest Doritos was supposed to pay us a million for taking the top spot. But nobody HAD to throw us a parade. That was special. Jay Leno was great too! I think both of us feel it’s not one moment in time to cherish now because it will be gone soon…. for us it was a beginning and not and end, so we’re just getting started. The coolest stuff to happen as a result of it haven’t happened yet…but it will. That’s making a movie… and seeing our board game become a huge hit.
The brothers sit down with former Doritos pitchman, Jay Leno
VCN: What are your plans for the future?
DAVE: It’s great to plan for the future but I don’t like to get too far ahead of myself. Joe and I began the filmmaking quest a bit over 5 years ago and our goal then was to shoot a feature film, something that we have not done yet. Winning the Crash is definitly not the END of our story. We continue to develop our feature scripts, write and direct commercials, and push our board game, TRIVIATHON, into the market. Both Joe and I, and our other three brothers for that matter, are entrepreneurially minded and are always thinking of new adventures to start. But no matter what direction we get spun into we go at it with all we got and, as Doritos says, “GO BIG, OR GO HOME TRYING!”
JOE: I keep finding myself answering a question only to read the next question and see Dave answer something similar to what I said in the previous question. actually… GO HOME TRYING is not even an option for us because we’ll simply never stop trying. We don’t give up on anything. That’s why any disputes we had as kids are still disputed today.. and will be forever. lol. Making a movie and turning our board game into a success are definitely our plans. Both of us have great wives and a bunch of crazy kids, and our other plans for the future lies with them.
The brothers visit Madison Avenue to announce this year’s Crash
VCN: You’ve probably been asked this more that a few times but if you had to give one piece of advice to someone planning to enter this year’s Crash the Superbowl contest, what would it be?
DAVE: My advice is to THINK! Actually put more thought into it than, “Hey, here is an idea…let’s make it!” The concept is KEY!!! It has to be funny…and not just funny between you and your friends. It has to be funny to everyone. Think about who the audience is and make it funny for them, without forgetting about who the commerical is for – Doritos. Doritos will pick the six finalists so THEY have to like the commercial first for you to have a shot. Read the rules to find out what specifically they are looking for. There have been TEN finalists so far in past Doritos Crash contests… go onto YouTube and get a visual idea to see what Doritos has chosen in the past and view the type of quality your spot has to be. Be creative and ORIGINAL!!! And don’t be afraid to bring in professionals if you can. Filmmaking is a TEAM sport!!! Build the best team that you can. If no one on your team has experience in filmmaking you’re going to be at a severe disadvantage!!! Do whatever you can to give yourself the advantage!! Contact your local film commision (every large city has one – google search to find the site/contact info for yours) and get in touch with REAL filmmakers to build into your team. If you have a GREAT idea then some of them should be willing to work for FREE and even bring their own equipment (professional labor, camera, lights, sound, etc. for FREE!!!!!) If you can’t find people willing to work then your IDEA may not be as good as you think!!! Get professional crew if you can…equipment if you can… actors if you can. Don’t just be satisfied with rounding up some friends if you want to take a REAL shot at WINNING!!!! You are not competing against other amateurs…in the end you are competing against the absolute BEST in the business, and if you don’t go into it knowing that then you will lose! But, with the right idea, if it is created at a professional level you can be the next million dollar media darling!!!!!! It’s worth the shot, and we’ve proved it possible. All that’s left is simply doing it!!!
JOE: Just because we did it, doesn’t mean someone can’t do it in a totally different way, and everyone should rely on their own gut feelings… that said my advice, for what it’s worth, is exactly what Dave said. And here’s my top 10 of things to rethink when entering the contest:
10. Doritos made nasty in some way then eaten anyhow does NOT make anyone want to buy and/or eat Doritos!
9. If you finished the commercial the same day you thought of it, OUCH!
8. If the BEST thing about your commercial is something from the toolbox, GOOD LUCK!
7. Doritos being used as a paper football is NOT a new idea!
6. Just because Halloween is coming up does NOT mean it’s smart to use your costume! (thieves, ninjas, monsters, etc.)
5. Just because it’s the Super Bowl doesn’t mean it has to be a commercial involving football! (of the 10 finalists in previous years none were)
4. Your pets and your kids are not half as cute or funny as YOU think they are!
3. Doritos orange dust finger prints has been done only a few hundred times!
2. Doritos causing a loser to get a hot girl has only been done a few thousand times!
1. Doritos bags treated like a person (especially dating a bag) has only been done a few million times!
MY OPINION ONLY – and I’m sure now that I said it that this years winners will have all the above, lol!
VCN: Thanks for the great interview guys. I’m going to get back to working on my entry right now!
Imagine this scenario: You’re a finalist in the Butterfinger video contest. You now have a one in four chance of winning ten thousand dollars. All you have to do to get the money is to get the most votes in the competition. To vote for videos on the butterfinger site, all you have to do is open a yahoo account. Now, imagine that you are just 200 or so votes away from winning the ten grand. How tempted would you be to take a day off work and do nothing but register and vote for your own video all day long?
Voting ended yesterday in the “Nobody’s gonna lay a finger on my Butterfinger” video contest and even though the vote counts of all the finalists are right there on the website for the world to see, no winner has been announced yet. The Butterfinger site says they are “tallying” the votes and a winner will be announced on October 1st.
What the heck is there to tally? The winner of the contest was supposed to be determined by a public vote. The votes are in and one video clearly has the most votes. Here’s the final results of the butterfinger contest:
I have a feeling that by “tallying” Butterfinger really means “checking for vote fraud.” I’ve been checking in on the voting in the last few days and it seemed really suspicious. Why did 2 videos peak at 9210 and 8046 votes while two other videos both made it past 12,000 votes? Is it because they are way more hilarious than the other videos? Not really. All four videos are pretty much equal in quality though I guess my personal choice would be “Robochop.” But according to the votes, the winning video is Butterfinger Phone App by David Markus.
First place. Prize: $10,000
As I said, I kept checking on the voting during the final days. As it got down to the wire, the number of votes coming in really seemed to jump. The top 2 videos were gaining hundreds of votes a day. Was some kind of advertising done to draw more people to the butterfinger site in the last days of the contest? Or maybe the people who made those top 2 videos remembered they had hundreds of friends and family members they hadn’t asked to vote yet?
During the final two days of the contest, the vote counts of the top two videos both were going up so steadily that it did seem like maybe 2 people (or two teams of people) were racing each other to the finish line. Maybe the reason the bottom two videos didn’t make it past 10,000 votes is because the people who made them saw that something fishy was going on and decided not to even bother after a certain point. So in the end, the “winner” was whoever had the willpower to crank out the most votes for themselves. This kind of vote fraud would be easy to prove if yahoo kept tabs of the IP addresses where the votes came from. I guess we’ll find out if they did that if they final scores have been adjusted when the winner is announced on October 1st.
Seems like every marketing guy and their momma is trying to entice us Joe Handycams into shooting ads for their company these days. There’s a lot of cash and a ton of prizes waiting to be won in online video contests and if you have even a smidge of writing, shooting or editing skills, all that awesome stuff could be yours. So you guys focus on winning ‘em and we’ll cover the aftermath of your glorious victories and/or pathetic defeats!
Video contests can get pretty ugly. Organizers do not always want to play by their own rules, other contestants flagrantly cheat and poorly run competitions cause frustrations for everyone. Wish you could bring a problem to the attention of a contest’s organizers but you’re worried that you might be branded a no-good troublemaker? We can help. Let us know about your problem and we’ll try and kick a little ass on your behalf. E-mail us at Videocontestnews@gmail.com.
