Just when you thought ads and advertising couldn’t get any more obnoxious, here comes Pepsi with a ‘short film’ showing everything that’s wrong with the industry and the culture today.
It’s supposed to be funny: A pizza delivery driver steps up to a porch and rings a doorbell, followed closely by an out-of breath dope slapping up the walk wearing Pepsi-branded coveralls and carrying a 12-pack of sugar water.
“Huah!” exclaims the winded Pepsi guy, startling the pizza delivery man nearly out of his socks.
A black screen and the words:
Pizza tastes better when chased by a Pepsi.
So that’s what we did.
Literally.
Que up some annoying high-speed music and we are off to the races — literally — with a montage of videos showing Pepsi-themed sports cars chasing down pizza delivery drivers to make sure their hungry customers enjoy their pizzas with Pepsi.
“We follow pizza drivers to make sure their customers get a Pepsi,” explains one Pepsi pizza chaser to his younger female colleague.
“Is that legal?” the woman asks.
“That’s a gray area,” replies the man.
(How hilarious are today’s advertising writers, yeah?)
More scenes of bewildered and unsuspecting pizza delivery people — and their customers — being stalked, harrassed, interrupted and annoyed by Pepsi pizza chasers.
When one pizza delivery guy on a bike waves for a trailing Pepsi car to pass him, the determined Pepsi driver says to himself out loud, “Not going anywhere, pal,” and continues the chase, earning an extended middle finger from the pizza guy, for which no one can blame him.
The video closes with a pizza driver filling up at a gas station and talking to someone — possibly his boss — on the phone. “Yeah, he’s still following me,” he says of the pizza chaser parked at the pump next to his. “I don’t know, some kind of TikTok bullshit,” says the irritated man.
And he is right. “Some kind of TikTok bullshit” is exactly what this big-brand, big-budget, irritating ad looks like.
Below: Seventy-six seconds of aggravated stupidity, courtesy of Pepsi and BBDO Worldwide.
Here’s what’s wrong with “Pepsi Chase Cars”
A stunt campaign created by agency BBDO Worldwide, “Pepsi Chase Cars” is designed to boost the brand’s partnership with DoorDash by handing out free pizza from Little Caesars, Papa Johns, Pizza Hut and Marco’s Pizza.
What it actually does, however, is demonstrate, with searing clarity, just how far the art, science, and craft of advertising have fallen.
Hailed as “brilliant” and “creative genius” by industry trade publications and the marketing sycophants on LinkedIn, Pepsi Chase Car is a prime example of everything wrong with advertising today. It’s loud, obnoxious, and utterly disrespectful of consumers’ intelligence. It reeks of a desperate attempt to go viral, and it makes everyone involved — the agency, the actors, the brand and consumers — look silly and stupid.
Word to the wise: If I am one of those pizza delivery drivers, I am stopping my car and getting out, and the only way that Pepsi person is leaving the scene is lying face-down on a stretcher, reflecting profoundly on his poor life choices with a one-liter plastic bottle of soda pounded deeply and enthusiastically up his ass.
Truth be told, that pretty much sums up how I would like to reward the entire advertising industry for its “work” in recent years.
Advertising has become a playground for attention-seeking stunts and gimmicks, with little regard for the audience or the brand’s reputation. Instead of authentic experiences, we are bombarded with noise, interruptions, and offensive content. It truly is a race to the bottom, and it’s enough to make anyone want to lodge a large object in the industry’s collective ass.
Cranky Ad Review rating: One soda-pop suppository out of five.
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I can’t help but think these ads are a refection of the times in more ways than one. Primarily in the way they reflect the skittish, jumpy, overstimulated minds of a younger generation whose very brain development and communication skills [or lack of] are being impacted by screens and social media.
The other thing that I see in full emergence is what I refer to as “Brand Banality”. The new generation inheriting these legacy brands seem to take their audience for granted. “Here it is… look at what we’re doing now”… Almost losing the entire plot that consumers and audiences are earned.
Brands need to actually sell things to maintain their presence on a practical level. There can be no coasting with brand influence, you are either gaining ground or losing ground. Ironically I am enjoying the recent push for nostalgia in some brands. Fascinated by how they are now reaching back to the pre-smartphone times to rekindle the fun and engagement of past campaigns… I see this as a way to honor the past and pull it forward, but sadly it’s also an indicator that within this past 18 years — an entire generation — there have been very few fresh ideas. Trying to be optimistic….
Absolutely agree! Thank you for making such excellent points. If you don’t mind, please share the names of the brands you mentioned that are trying to rekindle the magic of past campaigns . . . Heaven knows, it would do my cranky heart good to see them.
Perfectly articulated, I couldn’t agree more.
So true! When I see ads from back in the day they were intelligent. Of course they were made to sell you things but they were usually sleek, intelligent & had style. 💁🏻♀️
What’s more, the ads of yesteryear made consumers feel smart and practical for choosing the products they sold, rather than silly and stupid. Nowadays, everyone in ads looks as if they couldn’t pour water from a boot if the instructions were on the heel.
Thanks for reading and taking the time to comment.