Ad Nauseam: Drrrink! Bulmers, Budweiser and Heineken (and whatever you’re having yourself)

After successive summers of diabolical weather, 2010 is turning out to be a bit of a ripper (okay, it’s now raining outside, maybe I spoke too soon). Either way, I bet the folks in C&C are thanking their lucky stars there’s actually been a bit of cider-drinking weather this year. The company have suffered each time a wet summer rolls around.

Shoulda' gone to Torremolinos!

In fairness Bulmers have done a good job over the past years at ‘extending the season’ for cider consumption with their seasonal ads. For example, they always bring out those lovely posters with the twinkly fairy lights in the apple trees at Christmastime (I look forward to seeing them each year). Nevertheless summer is still critically important to them.

Anyways, there’s a whole heap of new Bulmers ads on the telly at the moment. Since launching Bulmers Pear last year (reacting swiftly to Kopparberg coming into the market in, er, 2005) they’ve changed tack from the swooping orchard-shots / gravelly Jerry Fish voice-over ads to something quite different. Something a bit more Middle Earth. Yes my friends, Bulmers have relocated to Hobbiton. Or at least they’ve stolen the soundtrack and costumes from Peter Jackson’s vaults.

Wanna job in Bulmers? Better stock up on your peaked caps and linen waistcoats!

Budweiser also have a snazzy new ad out for their Bud Ice Cold brand - touch the tap and it’ll freeze you quicker than a vat of liquid nitrogen in the Antarctic seems to be the message. Now, getting my lips stuck to a cold beer glass doesn’t entice me much, but the market research must put me in the minority ‘cos these super-dooper-extra-cold beer brands are all the rage at the moment. In any case, if we’re talking Budweiser, I prefer their “All Together Now” ad which was filmed out the side of a train in Chicago. It’s akin to the big brand ads Sony were doing so much of two or three years ago (Balls, Paint, Play Doh, Bubbles). Ah those Halcyon, pre-recessionary days! When filling an entire city with suds was a wholly acceptable use of a marketing budget. Good times.

Watching the Budweiser ad makes me feel kinda dizzy but much of that might be to do with the fact I’m trying to concentrate on what’s happening out the train window while also dancing round the room to the hippie Beatles cover by The Hours.

Of course a good song makes a world of difference to an ad. Heineken have always been a dab hand at picking quirky old-school songs to soundtrack their ads. Their latest features a natty tune from the legendary Louis Armstrong, originally recorded way back when in 1931. I defy you not to like it.

All this talk of beer makes a girl thirsty. To the off license! Now where’s me brolly?