The Best TV Ads Of All Time: PART 1

CWith the possibility of reaching billions and becoming ingrained in public memory forever, TV advertising is still the big fish in the advertising sea. The average Brit watches four hours of TV a day, with exposure to an average of forty-eight adverts a day. With these figures in mind, it's no wonder how memorable these adverts become. Television advertising is a unique artform, and one that is at the forefront of more people's lives than any other.

I'm sure I'm not alone in deciding my own Christmas Season has begun by the legendary "Holidays are Comin'" Coca Cola advert lighting up my television set. I also doubt being the only one who sees the DFS, MFI and Homebase January sales adverts as a festive apocalypse.


But now to the adverts I like, the adverts I love, and the adverts that I remember.


Although I was only a mere 9 years old at the time of it's release, Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO's legendary adverts for Guinness, Surfer, is as close to high art as I have ever seen on the small screen. From it's pulse-raising soundtrack to the Crane-esque white stallions galloping on the tide devouring the optimistically fearless surfer protagonists, Surfer has all the components needed to make television advertising history. Instead of ignoring the fact that Guinness does take a while to order at the bar, AMV BBDO decided to embrace this and make it the focus of the campaign. "Good things come to those who wait" is now a phrase that will forever be associated with Guinness, and Surfer will forever be remembered as the epitome of the prestige of the legendary beverage.

The zenith of TV advertising has to be the world's biggest brand, the corporation that has challenged and dominated the computer, mp3 player, mobile phone and tablet industries - Apple. For years Apple's television adverts have matched their products in terms of innovation and iconic status. Who can forget the break dancers silhouetted against a profusion of bright colours hawking the iPod? Or Mitchell and Webb (Justin Long and John Hodgman to you Americans out there) pointing out the seemingly never ending failures of PCs and highlighting the graceful simplicity and functionality of the Mac OS? Apple's advertising has consistently reflected their ethos as a brand, presented something that we all want and turned it into something that we need. Apple's piece de resistance came far earlier than these more recent campaigns. The advert that marked their change from 'Macintosh' to 'Mac', from an alternative to a competitor, has to 1997's Think Different campaign.

In celebrating so many great minds and personalities, Apple weren't just inspiring aspiration in consumers - they were aligning themselves with them. Perhaps it isn't unfair to say that Apple were acknowledging that their open challenge to Microsoft did in fact make them the "crazy ones". Suffice to say an affinity and appreciation for Apple spread through the consumer market like wildfire, and the Think Different campaign can be seen as a bench make moment for the corporation. BTD and ADT, if you will...

So concludes PART 1 of our Best of TV Ads Of All Time series, it won't be long for PART 2, where we'll explore more of the best, brightest and most innovative TV ads ever.