But I definitely have a favorite series of commericals that has me rolling everytime they come on. Perhaps you’ve seen them (or perhaps you haven’t, as they’re not driven into the ground like other ads), for Lipton‘s Sizzle and Stir dinners (warning: previous link goes to Lipton’s painfully bad corporate site—it’s almost as bad as their tea).
These ads are based around the idea that you can bring anybody to dinner with this product, even the most dysfunctional family. However, the family in the first two ads of this series are beyond what you could imagine.
In the first ad, the family was made up of Chuck Woolery, Sally Jesse Raphael, Little Richard and Pat Morita, with Morita and Little Richard arguing like little brothers about who had to set the table. The second ad features the husband and wife team of Mr. T and Loni Anderson trying to feed their kids Mary Lou Retton and George Hamilton. Mary Lou (in her training gear) fields a phone call and yells out, “George! It’s a girrrrrl.” Hamilton mumbles into the phone and hangs up. “She’s not my girlfriend,” he says, and stomps away. Friggin’ genius.
This guy liked the first ad (but not the Lipton ad with Pat Morita and Bruce Lee). Kate dug the second one. This discussion of the second ad went downhill even quicker than our “Jackass” Ping. And we can thank Neale-May for this great marketing gimmick.
I hope they continue this series of bizarre families at dinner time. I can think of some great combinations I’d love to see (mother: Nancy McKeon, father: Tony Danza, daughter: Dr. Ruth, brother: Maury Povich). Do you creative Pingers have any ideas to pass along to Lipton for future ads? -ram
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