The popularity of a good ad is maybe a month or so. The popularity of a great ad is a year, maybe two years. The best ads, however, stay popular for a lifetime. They pop up as references in TV shows or films across generations, allowing parents and their children (and maybe even their children’s children) to share a cultural touchstone even after a cultural shift through the years. Although so many ads, both old and current, can be touted as the “best of all time”, here are a few that have truly stood the test of time and are still fondly remembered, quoted, or parodied today.
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Creator: Susan Alisangan
Ad Agency: Chiat/Day
Apple has had a bevy of iconic ads over the years, so it’s difficult to choose which one to put on this list. However, these commercials of silhouetted people dancing to “Are You Gonna Be My Girl” by Jet”, “Technologic” by Daft Punk , or any other catchy song of the 2000s against a brightly colored background. Overtime, the ads expanded from selling the iPod itself to also promoting iTunes and while the style changed to feature musical artists like Nelly Furtardo and U2 in the ads themselves, the silhouette style was a cultural phenomenon. Anyone with a television during this time period, whether they were an adult, teen, or child had these memorable, eye-catching, and colorful ads stuck in their heads and really wanted to buy an iPod.
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Art Director: Helmut Krone
Ad Agency: DDB Worldwide
An oldie, but a goodie. The “Think Small” ad campaign by Volkswagen changed how people viewed the car and the company as a whole. Created in 1959, this minimalist print ad was cool, calm, collected, and most importantly, successful. This ad shows that sometimes doing the least has the most impact and it ushered in the popularity of the odd looking Volkswagen Beetle, going from novelty to chic throughout the 1960s. It’s no wonder that “Think Small” was voted as the best ad of the twentieth century by AdAge.
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Ad Agency: DDB Worldwide
Like the ads say, it just keeps going and going and going. The sunglasses-wearing, drum-beating, flip-flop sporting pink bunny first walked into the public eye in 1988 and has remained iconic since then. The fact that the Energizer Bunny began as a parody of the mascot for a competing battery brand is something most people of a certain generation aren’t even aware of. The Energizer Bunny has ascended from parody level to surpassing its competitor in recognition and has continued to thrive almost thirty plus years later.
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Ad Agency: Ogilvy & Mather
Dove’s ongoing “Real Beauty” ads have brought an important question to the forefront of everybody’s mind: “What is beauty?” After learning that most women didn’t view themselves as beauty, Dove set out to change how beauty should be discussed and viewed. As opposed to other beauty brands, Dove’s ads didn’t feature overly made-up women who touted an unreachable standard that can never be reached but instead normal, everyday women learning to embrace their own beauty. Going with a natural and honest approach to advertising proved to be successful and Dove’s “Real Beauty” ads have influenced other brands to try and do the same. However, none have been on the same level as Dove’s ads.
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Creator: Charles Stone III
Ad Agency: DDB Worldwide
Sometimes, one word is all it takes. In 1999, Budweiser cracked the code when it premiered its first Whassup? commercial to the public during Monday Night Football. Once it hit the airwaves, an amazing ad campaign was born. Seeing friends drunkenly slur the phrase “what’s up?” in an increasingly humorous fashion, a simple concept to some, was so popular that the campaign continued until 2002. Also the ad won the Grand Clio Award, was inducted into the CLIO Hall of Fame, won the Canned Grand Prix, has been parodied in films such as Scary Movie and TV shows such as The Simpsons, Friends, and even The Office,
seven years after the ad first aired. An updated version was even released in 2020 to show friends checking in on each other during the pandemic, showing that it can still leave a cultural impression.
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Director: Tom Kuntz
Ad Agency: Wieden+Kennedy
While this is a newer ad campaign, it’d be an oversight to leave out Old Spice’s iconic string of ads that began in 2010. The first one was only 30 seconds long, but what a highly entertaining 30 seconds. Using visual humor, quick changes of costumes, sets, and props, and a shirtless speed-talking man (played by Isaiah Mustafa), these one take commercials packed so much in a short amount of time that it was always a delight to see them on television. Each commercial had its own spin on things, like featuring Terry Crews or Fabio, but the wry comedic styling, which is one of the highlights of the ad, was always pitch perfect. How could this not be on a “best ads” list?
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Director: Joe Sedelmaier
Ad Agency: Dancer Fitzgerald Sample
1984 was a different time. Today, it seems odd that fast food chain Wendy’s would ever need a huge ad campaign to help it stand out from its competitors. However, in 1984 Wendy’s did just that with just three simple words: “Where’s the Beef?” Those three words, famously shouted by elderly actress Clara Peller as she looked at big fluffy hamburger buns sans any hamburger, pushed Wendy’s to the forefront and launched a sensation. This ad not only put a spotlight on Wendy’s and Clara Peller, but it also produced “Where’s the Beef?” bumper stickers, a board game, t-shirts, and even a hit song of the same name. Wendy’s even revived the ad campaign twice: first in 2011 answering “Here’s the Beef” and again in 2020 after a shortage of beef prompted Wendy’s to ask “Where’s the Beef?”
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Creator: Bill Backer
Ad Agency: McCann Erickson
This ad might be one that people haven’t seen on television in years, but it’s one that has retained importance through cultural osmosis. In 1971, the first and most famous version of this ad aired. A group of multicultural young adults standing on a hill, each one holding a bottle of Coca-Cola (with the labels in different languages) smiling and united while singing a version of the song “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing (In Perfect Harmony)” by the Hillside Singers became one the first iconic ads by Coca-Cola. The commercial helped to push Coca-Cola into a new societal era, a time with an avid focus on peace and bringing people together during the Vietnam War. While there have been versions of the ad for Christmas, or featuring Mickey Mouse, or even NASCAR drivers, the commercial famously was brought to a new generation of people in the series finale of AMC Networks’ Mad Men.
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Ad Agency: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
The phrase “Got Milk?” is so seared into the public consciousness that one forgets that it’s from an ad campaign. And not just commercials, the first of which premiered in 1993, but also print ads that were plastered everywhere from subway stations, to public libraries, to literally any public area. Seeing Beyonce, Britney Spears, Serena Williams, The Simpsons, Batman, and other cultural icons both real and fictional with a milk mustache and the simple phrase in a thin black font is an image that feels normal to see that it’s interesting to think about how it wasn’t just a regular thing before the campaign. The iconic ads have been parodied all over the place, in Friends, Rick and Morty, and even by the cast of the Broadway musical Hamilton. Truly one of the best ads of all time!
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Ad Agency: Wieden+Kennedy
Just Do It: a call to action, a motivator, a way for you to get out of your own head, and a fantastic ad campaign. Since 1988, Nike ads have been telling us to “Just Do It” and the public has been hanging on to that slogan ever since. Like the old adage says, “if it’s not broke, don’t fix it” and Nike has taken that to heart since this ad campaign hasn’t changed since it started. Everyone knows it, everyone loves it, and this simple but powerful ad has pushed Nike as one of the most popular brands of all time. The ad received a different lens when Shia LaBeouf loudly yelled in some greenscreen footage and it became an internet sensation in 2015. To celebrate the 30th anniversary of the “Just Do It” ad campaign, Nike enlisted LeBron James, Serena Williams, Colin Kapernick, and other athletes for a short video called “Dream Crazy.” Nike including Colin Kapernick in the video resulted in a boycott, but ultimately Nike came out on top.
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