The Ten Most Annoying Commercials of 2010
Commercials. We love ‘em, we hate ‘em, they give us a chance to hit the restroom and for the folks who own the networks and produce the content, they pay the bills. Some commercials are great. Many are downright annoying. Some are annoying because their premises are flawed. Some are annoying because their corporate campaign has run its course and devolved from edgy or hip to become old and annoying. Some are just annoying because they’re based around spokesmen who are annoying, who are made to do annoying things.
Here’s my list of the commercials that annoyed me most over the past year.
10. Mayflower’s Ginormous Puppet
Moving is stressful, expensive and annoying. Perhaps moving is more bearable when you’re a gigantic, lifeless puppet on strings. That’s what Mayflower seems to think. Add in a blandly folksy soundtrack and you’ve got yourself one of the weirder, yet more hypnotic, ads of the year. I suspect that the art director behind this ad set spends a lot of time at anti-war protests.
9. Every Kiss Begins With Kay — “Storm”
Every kiss begins with “k” — but so does “killer.”
Jewelry ads are huge around Christmastime. This campaign aired every five minutes in the weeks before Christmas, and suggests that your loved ones’ affections can be bought for baubles. The guy here is supposed to be comforting in the midst of a storm, but he comes off as creepy. Maybe that’s because Kay used a convention that every horror flick uses — startle the characters with one thing, let them settle down after the fright, only to see them hacked to pieces by the killer at the moment of lowest tension. That sets up the audience in these ads to suspect that the guy will either have to fight off an ax-wielding killer, or he’ll be unmasked as a killer whom the girl will end up having to escape from, probably killing him along the way. Sadly, his only crime ends up being the attempt to buy his girl’s unending loyalty with some jewelry. And he succeeds.
It’s only less annoying than the Zales campaign, below, because it did not ruin any classic rock.
8. Pajama Jeans
George Costanza would wear these jeans. ‘Nuff said. Though I do love the line about the “struggle to fit into ordinary jeans.” We’ve gotten to the point now where blue jeans, themselves an icon of the dressed down culture, are just too much for us.
7. Lexus for Christmas
Let’s be honest. Sticking a full size car in your house, just to surprise someone on Christmas morning, is begging for trouble. For one thing, in most homes just installing a flatscreen TV requires drills and noise. How does one go about getting a car under a Christmas tree? Some walls are gonna have to move. And then..who picks up the payments? What if the thing leaks a bit of fluid on that pristine floor? Those tires are bound to track in a little road gunk.
6. Audi’s Green Police
This was Audi’s 2010 Super Bowl Ad. It’s extremely well produced and even fun to watch, which is part of the reason it’s so annoying. Audi seems to be celebrating the onset of Green Dictatorship, as long as its cars are part of the escape. But that will never work. First they came for the Hummers…
I would absolutely throw in a couple of the Geiko commercials, especially the one with the little Pig squealing “wee” all the way home. Annoying as hell and LOUD to boot.
Absolutely agree on Geico ads, damn near all of them (except for the woodchucks). What baffles me, is why Warren Buffett, who owns Geico, thinks that aggravating and infuriating potential customers will cause them to flock to his company for insurance.
You have to admit the one with R. Lee Ermy as the drill instructor psychologist is rather amusing. (And if more namby pamby brain-cases were actually treated like this, maybe our society wouldn’t be getting so wussified nowadays?)
I have to agree. Despite seeing this one over and over it does not fail to amuse.
Now, if we could get Obama on that couch…
“You know what makes ME sad? YOU DO! Maybe we should chug on over to Socialism is Dead Land where maybe we can find a domestic policy agenda for you, you Jack-wagon!”
“Tissue? – Crybaby!”
Sorry, Peter, but the one with the DI psychologist is the WORST of the Geico commercials. Makes me long for the cave men!!
One TV adverstisent I always like and watch is for “Go To Meeting”. Where the two “losers” are trying to outsell ecah other. Rack up large orders for the new Mr. Sushi Stapler
No way. Geico rocks. They beat most TV shows.
i disagree it may be annoying but it is quite cute!
Well, there were at least ten different Progressive commercials with Flo, so take any ten of them and you have my top ten list. Maybe my dislike of Flo colors my perception, but I think the State Farm guy seems kind of normal in comparison.
I don’t mind Flo, but I hate that new peppy-scratchy voice that’s become so popular for female voiceovers. “Call or click today!”
Gotta add another jewelry add: “He got it at Jared’s”, “He got it at Jared’s”, “He got it at Jared’s”, “He got it at Jared’s”.
Feels like a Groundhog day nightmare, but one where you’re stuck in high school.
Just awful.
> He got it at Jared’s.
Good time to channel Rowan and Martin. “I think I got it too.”
I’ll add another to the hit parade: those truly stupid Nationwide Insurance commercials.
Oh yes, and I’d also like to sucker-punch “The Saver.”
Ever hear of TIVO?
The Audi Green Police ad didn’t annoy me as much as some of the others. The “police anteater” at 0.43 is only seen for a second or two, but it’s a stroke of genius.
I’m with Gregg on the Flo ads. Hate ‘em.
No, nothing can top Progressive and that relentlessly irritating harpy with the bright red lipstick. Flo, is it? I’m just thankful I haven’t had any nightmares with her in them yet.
Progressive is owned by Peter Lewis, who has donated many millions to AmericaComingTogether, the ACLU and many democratic causes. He runs the incessant Flo ads on Fox to warp our minds. Kind of like playing “Tie a Yellow Ribbon…” outside Noriega’s compound. DON’T BUY PROGRESSIVE INSURANCE!
Meanwhile, Geiko runs a fairly entertaining assortment of ads.
Lots of good choices here. Certainly, the emasculated purse-carrier is up there in my personal list of losers. If masculinity is dead, Madison Avenue is its obituarist.
But for me, the worst of the commercials involve what passes for singing and musical composition these days. The voices are light, airy, with no character. The Apple iPod commercials — retcchhhh. “I tried to do handstands for you,” my aching butt. The male singing voices in commercials, when you can find them, are even worse. Not a Y chromosome within earshot. The background music, all block chords set to an insipid electronic drumbeat. Music used to be an art form. Now, it’s just an accessory.
Any thing Apple does reeks of adolescent smugness. While Apple products often feature bold designs and innovative technology they offer little in actual functionality over competing devices. Retina screen technology is my favorite. It’s millions of colors cannot be discerned by the human eye and merely eat up processing power. The were three generations of android technology between the first iPhone and the iPhone 4 and within weeks of the introduction of the 3G iPhone 4 superior 4G android phones were on the market.
The iPad is nothing more then a bulky iPod and Apple knows it. It is just another way to pry money out those who never grew up. The Samsung android powered tablet is a superior product because it is actually portable. If the iPad were the future Apple wouldn’t be developing new laptops now would they?
For all you Apple fan boys and girls out there I use a Blackberry, which is not as slick as an iPhone or Android device, but provides all the functionality that is required of a smartphone. Like Apple I use and Intel powered computer using a non windows operatiing system (Linux)
do even still make the samsung….get real, your an apple hater, and the blackberry?? Really…
Normally I think the Geico ads are kind of funny, if annoyingly ubiquitous. But that one where the woman upbraids the gecko, mistaking him for “Stanley”, really grates. All I can think when I see it is “lonely, middle-aged single career woman let herself be taken advantage of by a lizard at some soulless corporate convention”.
Not a good message, Geico.
I also hate the Dairy Queen “big floating lips” commercials.
Can’t stand the “Focus group approved non-threatening Hispanic urban male” in the State Farm ads.
Absolutely agree on Geico ads, damn near all of them (except for the woodchucks). What baffles me, is why Warren Buffett, who owns Geico, thinks that aggravating and infuriating potential customers will cause them to flock to his company for insurance. Can it really work?
The commercials that really annoy me are those stupid insurance ones (I can’t remember the company) where they show that they have no idea what the word “responsibility” means, even though they’ve made “Responsibility” the centerpiece of their ad campaign. I can understand that the advertising people didn’t graduate high school, but doesn’t it annoy the CEO, or anyone else in management who actually speaks English, to see how they’ve been wasting money on this campaign just to make the company look really stupid? It’s sort of Alanis Morissette’s “Ironic” (which had not one example of irony in it) taken to Madison Avenue and the tube. Pathetic. Really.
One word: Zoosk.
Wait, that’s not a word…
I’m certain I will get crap for this choice (not from the regulars here) – I utterly loath the “Council of La Raza” commercial that airs on Fox. Naturally, they have to have at least one or two of the people in the commercial speak in Spanish. All of that mock seriousness about “Tell them in Washington.”
Kia has some cute commercials using small rodents. They are not on very often,unfortunately, but they are much more entertaining than most car ads.
The Geico “Honest Abe” ad was hilarious. The others, mostly snoozers. The Progressive ads are so-so, and while the “man-bag” one shows a “whipped” husband, that he acknowledges the ridiculousness of it by his eye movement toward his overbearing wife at least buys him a little sympathy. The linked set of “Sienna” ads, with their insipid “Mommy Likes” and “Daddy Likes” taglines take the cake. The “hot” MILF trucking around in her minivan, the emasculated, metrosexual “Dad”, probably schlepping down to the mini-mart for some Kraft Lite Singles on command from the head of the house, without a doubt offers up the worst commercial painting any white male as an idiot or a eunuch. If there are only women in a ad, the black one has all the answers. If there are women and a man, the man is the moron. If it’s just men, the white guy is the slack-jawed hick.
Snake,
The Sienna minivan has a special cubbyhole for Dad’s testicles.
The state farm “cute agent carrie gets her revenge” link takes you to the video where the guy talks over the girl.
Many of the SC Johnson commercials (window cleaners, floor cleaners, scented candels, etc.) glorify in injuring and humiliating the husband character in any number of ways. Practically the only things they haven’t done (with only slight exaggeration) is spray acid in his face, cut off some of his body parts, or slice him with razor blades.
For the life of me, I can’t see what injuring, degrading, and humiliating the men has to do with selling products.
Actually, the vignettes in Audi’s Green Gestapo (Ad # 6 in your countdown) came across as a probable forecaster of our future — did not seem like a spoof to me, but somewhat ominous.
Will NEVER buy an Audi now…
Continuing along these lines, I think the creepiest ad, EVER, had to be that ObamaCare ad that they ran on Fox for a while, where the patient and his doctor are consulting on a stage, with a packed audience of other doctors (and who knows who else) who keep yelling out the patient’s private medical history, even to the patient’s shock and surprise on an ad that was supposed to be promoting such insane intrusions into our lives.
I don’t know who thought that was a good idea, but that ad sent shivers down my spine, and flames shooting out of my eyeballs. I have not even run into any liberals who liked it. It seems that everyone was really put off by the idea … except for the political class, of course.
I do not watch television for just the reason of bad commercials even though I have cable. I use the high speed internet and the telephone while my 86 year old mother watches the television when she is not on the phone or internet!
Every now and then I watch History Channel or if I want news I go to Fox news!
No. 20, I despise tv “snobs.” There is much on tv worth watching; and, being practically homebound, I get a lot out of it. I also explore the internet, do e-mail, and write a blog. But that can’t occupy 24 hours, entertaining as it is.
Then there’s the beer commercial where a smart-alec barmaid insults the masculinity of a customer who doesn’t order the right kind of beer. As if someone working for tips would gratuitously insult a customer to his face.
Actually, I’ve seen it happen many times, and then they get even more snippy when they don’t get the amount of tip they believe they are entitled to.
We could easily make a list of 1,000 commercials that portray the husband as an idiot…just turn on the tv for an hour and count them.
I can understand that perhaps women are the main target for these products….but a basic rule of advertising is not to alienate anyone who might be a potential customer. It’s also a little frightening to consider that there may be a lot of women receptive to these commercials.
I like the AT&T commercial with the orange silk. I like it for the Nick Drake song. I also like the TV commercial with the bouncy balls, with the Jose Gonzales song.
None of the commercials mentioned hold a candle to the brave new world of prescription drug ads. Who can eat and watch TV anymore? Let’s think about arterial plaque build up, or let’s watch a graphic of poor blood circulation. (I have been intrigued by one of the possible side effects of the ‘restless leg’ condition medication, where you might gamble compulsively).
On another note, maybe we’ll dwell on male enhancement pills. Hey, I know, let’s talk about the smell of cat feces! Blech.
As far as the Christmas commercials go, I thought the Zale’s ads were a far distance second to the BMW “Privileged Little Snot” commercials where he’s willing to bankrupt his parents to get them to get him the best toys and best guitar before picking a Beamer as his car of choice. The message apparently being “Spoiled A-holes drive BMWs. Why aren’t you?”
(Also, I can tell the Microsoft “To the cloud” commercials are going to roll on into 2011 — right now only the airport one is on my Bottom 10 list, but Bill Gates still has 365 more days to work that ad campaign up my s-list.)
Plus, the jewelry in the stalker Kay commercial was godawful.
Radio commercials are worse. Local no-talents having “natural,” “spontaneous” “conversations” about what’s on the ballot, how to get the best home loan, the delights of Santa Barbara, half of them set to the most annoying jingles in the universe.
My current favorite radio comercial is one playin on the Boston stations where they advertise a fire-starting aid that provides a flame “…this big!” Um, you do realize you’re on the radio, right? How big is “this big”? 1 inch? 6 inches? 20 feet? Will this thing burn down my entire neighborhood?
Personally, I would would vote FOR the Geico commercial starring R. Lee Ermey as a therapist as a “Best of 2010″ commercial. The antidote for Progressive “Man Purse” commercial and at least Ermey accurately diagnoses the man’s problem.
I’m with you, DWK. The DI turned psychiatrist is my favorite 2010 commercial – it never fails to make me laugh!
Here’s a little inside baseball for commercial evaluaters: the secret of a good commercial is one that makes you remember the product. If you can’t remember that, the commercial is not successful. Hate me or love me, but just remember my name! An excellent example is Progressive Insurance and Flo – everyone remembers the product!
The Geico commercials are less offensive than most, they do not actively insult their customers or imply that you are buying from lunatics. Just a genial goofball boss, which is what many pray for.
The Green-fascist auto ad was truly disturbing. If half way through a mob had turned on them and started to beat the gestapo down while the Audi escaped it would have shown him as less noble but at least the aftertaste would have been less offensive. Sixty-five years is to soon for Germans to advertise this way. That holds double for a unit of the original Kraft durch Freude People’s Car Company, Volkswagen.
The AT&T ad evoked Christo’s public art kitsch shtick. Like with the Duke and The King in Huckleberry Finn no one wants to admit they’re a rube who got conned, until everyone else has been conned.
Asking $40 for sweat pants is brass that would impress Jubal Harshaw.
Notice that not every man is shown as an emasculated loser. The black guy with the white wife and a car in his $3,000,000 house does not look likely to carry a purse.
The Staples ad has vanished.
I have no idea what the Mayflower ad was about. The skill of the handlers is admirable and I hope that Macy’s calls them for Thanksgiving.
Perhaps there is no tasteful way to mass merchandise jewelry. My guess is that Costco is killing the mall outlets at the low end. During a recession/depression those striving to prove they really still have it will move to conspicuously consume luxury goods. So the high end will benefit for a while.
Ah, Lifeofthemind, you reminded me of another. Those really stupid “Old Spice” commercials, with the “I have a , now it’s diamonds, don’t you wish your husband was me, now I’m on a horse.”
Funny once, thereafter really, really stupid.
The new FedEx ads are most annoying. Normally I support FedEx over the Teamsters’ Brown, but these insults to my intelligence have allowed my psychic to ship Christmas packages via UPS. Prior to them I would have driven the extra half mile to go to FedEx Ground.
Great list.
For me the most annoying commercial(s) in 2010 were the Hyundai holiday ones with the “quirky” couple performing Christmas songs and doing silly stuff. I was hoping they would stop running them when Christmas was over, but they’re still on.
Please let the nightmare end.
Hawk -
Egad! I had put that nightmarish commercial out of my consciousness whilst reading this entertaining commentary. But you’re right. That horrid Hyundai commercial made me sick as well. I cannot stand “Jingle Bells or “Up on the Rooftop” as it is, but whether it is the blank looks on couples’ faces, or the weird gestures, the commercials are stomach turning. Perhaps they will be recalled, now that the Christmas holidays are officially over – that is until next October.
The duo in that commercial are an actual musical group called Pomplamoose, and their videos are exactly like that commercial. I got curious enough about the commercial one night to look them up on-line. I actually like their music. Some of the classic remakes are nice, and the self-written tunes are a little strange but easy to listen to.
They can be found on You Tube at
http://www.youtube.com/user/PomplamooseMusic
Give them a look. I recommend the remake of “Mr Sandman.”
Pomplamoose. Congratulations. You have found a music group that epitomizes everything that is wrong with modern pop music. Music that is aggressively non-melodic. Voices so thin they can’t be more than an angstrom thick. Lyrics that were written by a doe in heat. Listening to it is like cleaning the wax out of my ears with a flaming corkscrew. Compared to the great songwriters of the 20th century — Gershwin, Porter, Warren, Mercer, Mancini — this is thin gruel indeed.
OK, let’s Take Five here. As one who spent over 30 years in and around the advertising business, one of the most important aspects of developing and producing a TV spot or campaign is this: At the end of those annoying 30 seconds – did anyone watching actually remember the name of the client who paid all that money to have their commercial produced?
tick-tic-tic …
I can’t tell you how many times a neighbor, friend or anyone I chatted up in the hood would tell me how great that commercial for (a) the (uuh) car (b) that insurance company or (c) a fast food spot … was.
After asking (a) which car? (b) which insurance company? And (c) which fast food place? – the next sounds I’d often hear were … crickets.
chirp-chirp-chirp …
Without going into all the minutia necessary to develop a successful campaign – at the end of those (so-called) annoying 30 seconds, if the viewer can’t recall your clients name or who the sponsor is – a few million creatively spent bucks just went down the dumper.
It’s kind of like celebrities often tell reporters: “Go ahead and write anything you want. Just spell my name right.”
And when the “dealin’s done” — that’s the only thing that really matters.
I, too, have spent decades dealing with adverts – in my case print for B2B. The very fact that this list exists, and is being added to, proves the power of ads. We all have our faves and most-despised, but the bottom line is that they do work, otherwise why would Business spend so much producing these sometimes-clever-sometimes-not 15, 30 and 60 second tv shows.
Unless you’re talking about a political ad, the only thing that really matters isn’t whether the viewers remember the company’s name. What really matters is whether the ad help promote sales. For example, back in the early 1970s, Alka Seltzer had a series of very funny ads that everyone was talking about. “Mama Mia, That’s a Spicey Meatball” and “I Can’t Believe I Ate the Whole Thing” were classic ads. However, they didn’t result in increased sales so they were ultimately a failure. Anything else is simply narcissism on the advertising agency’s part. I can’t begin to count how many times I’ve seen an ad and have no idea what they’re advertising or who the company is. Furthermore, if a company insults me with an ad, there’s no way in hell I’m going to buy anything from them.
One thing remains ubiquitous. Some dumb, frumpy looking guy, acting as the husband, is being educated by/taken care of/ordered about/made to look bad by a swell looking gal, who in reality wouldn’t even look at him twice.
JG Wentworth: “It’s MY MONEY and I want it NOW!” makes my ears bleed.
Drug ads: Most of the pointless gauze-like pharmaceutical ads on TV that spend half of their voiceover copy warning you of the debilitating consequences of buying their product. Pharmaceuticals are hardly consumer products. Do they think I’m going to demand a product because I saw it advertised on TV? How much could drug companies cut their prices if they didn’t spend 60% of their revenues on advertising?
Public service announcements: I never saw one that wasn’t a self-justifying public relations parade float. I wonder how much money the federal government wastes on this crap. It amazes me that anybody with half a brain thinks this kind of behavioral terraforming actually accomplishes anything except to justify larger and larger budgets.
I agree with most of you that Flo should be taken out back and shot dead.
I think I’m going to be the first person to point out that 10 annoying commercials got free plugs.
The one that annoys me the most has missed being placed on this list. The dorky looking guy with a blue 1960′s era phone strapped to his body, selling insurance for Nation Wide…you know..Nation wide is on your side.
If they are on MY side they would take that ad off the air!
I would like to nominate the Chevron and United HealthCare underwriting spots on PBS. Does Chevron really think we believe what they’re telling us about how socially conscious the corporation is? Same goes for United HealthCare. Both spots are incredibly insulting to PBS viewers. Better that they just show their names as contributors like the underwriting foundations do.
I actually like the Geico & Progressive ads, the gecko & Flo have more depth than most tv shows these days.
Hate the jewelry store ads (Zales, you can’t always tell whether the woman is happy or ticked off) and State Farms, that guy truly is annoying.
Would have to add about a dozen political commercials to this list, especially those for Harry Reid.
There are just so many irritating ads out there, that it is hard to judge which is the worst. So many of the ads that are speaking to the elderly are really bad. I should know, as I am one of the elderly. EG: scooter store,
the little old lady and her daughter, forget what they are advertising, but who cares? They are driving me crazy.
I am guessing a good ad is from Capitol One. At least they are funny.
The absolute WORST kiNd of ad, is where they use the tune to a well known christmas song and replace the words with what some idiot thinks are clever, funny? words praising the advertiser. (the one this year was the singers in the mall singing about macy’s to winter wonderland-YECH!) iT’S NOT FUNNY, IT’S NOT CLEVER, IT’S NOT CUTE it’s just ANNOYING. iT RUINS CHRISTMAS, CHRISTMAS MUSIC AND IT MAKES ME HATE YOU!!!
I have to confess…all of these commercials were annoying in one sense or another, but my least favorite, these days, is the locally-made one that runs on the off channels. There’s a guy locally who runs a mattress store, and he has particularly annoying commercials. He is always yelling “I’ll beat anyone’s advertised price or your mattress is FREEEEEEEE!!!!!” He used to have an accountant who would always wail, “You’re killing me Larry!!!!” but apparently that wasn’t popular enough (or maybe Larry succeeded finally). Anyway, the guy’s competion constantly yells (in a particularly high annoying voice, that shouldn’t be allowed to make TV commercials) “I won’t be beat!” Whenever this is on while my wife is in the room, she always mutters that she *will* beat him if she meets him in a dark alley.
My favorite, however, is a guy who sells garage doors. Talk about a mundane item you’ve never seen advertised before. He’s got a round bullet head, a raspy high-pitched voice, and a very practiced delivery that hints at hours spent in front of a mirror at home. He gestures, and even at one point carefully steps one step forward to emphasize a point, all the while whining that “…if you buy it anywhere else, you’re throwing your money away!”
I always refer to such people as the latest winners of the Robert Haft award. You remember, the guy who owned Crown Books? “If you paid full price, you didn’t buy it at Crown Books.” I used to work in a Crown, and one of my co-workers did a reasonably good impression of Haft’s screechy east-coast accented whine. He would hide in the store on occasion, and use it, so that the customers would look at each other and say in wonder, “He’s here?” The voice was so distinctive and bad for a commercial that he never should have been allowed to do it…so I give an award in his honor, semi-regularly…
The ad that annoys me most has this guy standing there shirtless. He paints his torso white. Then using this as a background, he paints other stuff really fast on his torso. I don’t know what product is being advertised. Maybe paint?
There’s a commercial for a training shoe that promises to make a woman’s backside more shapely and appealing. It is a work of art.
Other than that, my DVR watches TV for me- so I am just blasting thru the ads on fast forward.
Thanks for the list, having watched it I feel I have done my part to stay connected with that aspect of pop-culture. Sitting through it reinforces my view that I haven’t missed much, and likely avoided wasting countless hours by deciding not to have television piped into my house for the last four years.
As always Brian, Thanks for the insights.
I’m glad to see someone else besides me thought the gigantic woman puppet in the Mayflower commerical was creepy and disturbing. I’d like to see You Tube videos of ad agency account guys pitching these lame creative concepts to a roomfull of clueless clients too afraid to say “no” for fear the agency people might think they’re a bunch of squares.
One of the most annoying commercials is for Chase–either the bank or MasterCard. It starts out with this woman saying “Beer and wine. . .” and she has the more fingernails-on-the-chalkboard voices I’ve ever heard. Can’t hit the mute button fast enough.