Mitre 10 ‘sandpit kids’ NZ’s fave ad
The Mitre 10 ‘Sandpit kids’ ad has been voted by the NZ public as the Best Ad in Fair Go’s annual ad awards. It crunched the competition in the votes it received (view the nominees list here). Its five-year-old stars, Ruben and Benjamin, truly stole the show and won the hearts of our nation. Made by DraftFCB, MD Justin Mowday made special note of this ad in our recent post.
And the Worst Ad award went to … Telecom XT for the famously irritating, improbable and OTT ads starring Richard Hammond! Hee hee. Not only did the ads’ use of ‘hyperbole’ annoy us down-to-earth Kiwis, many of us were just plain frustrated that the XT network didn’t work in our part of the country.
Fair Go editor Graeme Muir concurs: “We’re also not sure that importing an Englishman to sell product works anymore, it used to in the 1970s and 1980s but I’m not sure Hammond worked as well as Telecom would have hoped.
“Overall, I think the XT campaign was a bit like a Hollywood blockbuster that tanked – it was a bit overblown and didn’t really deliver.”
Close-second worst ad: Cadbury ‘Eyebrows’
Troy
September 30, 2009
I believe the campaign has been incredibly successful, so there ya go
Debra
October 1, 2009
What about the wisdom of crowds, Troy? – worst ad? or successful campaign?
Duncan Stuart
October 1, 2009
Well I lost my bet. I thought Eyebrows would storm in as the Worst Ad – the Richard Hammond ads weren’t great, they reeked of Saatchi Classic really, the same creative bottle of Old Spice that gave us Jack Palance, and other overseas “names” in various Saatchi ads of the 80s and 90s. Yeah dated, and yeah – a mismatch between promise and delivery(though gee, does Telecom mobile really work out in Auckland harbour??) but worst ad? I think not.