February 5, 2007

Highlights of the 2007 Ad Bowl Symposium>>

Anheuser-Busch wins both the student and online poll in Ad Bowl IV

Final score and Bud Light’s ax-wielding hitchhiker is the best Super Bowl commercial in 2007! University of South Carolina advertising students have deemed it the best Super Bowl ad in three categories: persuasiveness, likability and brand identity. It is the third year in a row a Bud Light ad has won USC’s Ad Bowl.

More than 65 students, faculty and friends of the School of Journalism and Mass Communications attended Ad Bowl IV to critique Super Bowl ads. This year for the first time, the College of Hospitality, Retail and Sport Management’s dean, Pat Moody, and several sport management faculty members joined the polling.

How the students and faculty ranked the ads:

Students in Associate Professor Bonnie Drewniany’s “Super Bowl Commercials: 1984 to 2007” class gathered for the big game at Newsplex, the USC/Ifra converged newsroom. They systematically rated each ad during the Super Bowl to assess how brand identity, likability and persuasiveness were manifested in the commercials. Professor Drewniany said the turnout this year was impressive, and attendance has steadily increased over the past four years. Each student and guest used a remote control polling device to rate the commercials after viewing them. A Replay TV system paused the telecast after each commercial.Anheuser-Busch also won the School's online poll, which opened at the conclusion of the game for a wider audience. The Budweiser ad "Spot" won the Best Overall category and was particular popular with female voters.

Professor Drewniany was pleased with the results of the evening. “My students and I are looking forward to I-Comm Week, when we invite the winning ad creators to visit my class. We’ll be able to get a good sense of their thinking when they developed the commercial.” Dean Charles Bierbauer of the College of Mass Communication and Information Studies added, “The fact that industry professionals show up to accept their awards represents a level of respect for our program.”

Dean Bierbauer said, “Ad Bowl is an instructive opportunity where the students can be entertained while learning about the trade.” HRSM Dean Moody added, “It’s a great opportunity for the sports and tourism marketing faculty to strengthen our relationship with the Journalism School.”

“I was pleasantly surprised to witness the correlation and integration of fun in a classroom atmosphere,” said Li Ping Cai, who is a tourism marketing professor at Purdue University in Indiana, who was visiting USC during Super Bowl Sunday.

Over the last few weeks, students in Professor Drewniany’s class have reviewed commercials from previous years to identify trends and determine the strengths — and weaknesses — in each new commercial. Sophomore Tom Benning, a student in the Honors College class, said, “It’s cool to be involved in decisions that can make or break an ad agency because Super Bowl ads cost an average $2.6 million for 30 seconds of air time. We, as the targeted demographic for most of the commercials, provide valuable input to the agencies in their decision making."

See which ads won in 2006, 2005 and 2004>>