Take 5 with Reeses: Reese’s hilarious 2020 Superbowl advertisement
One of my family’s favorite parts about watching the Superbowl are the humourous commercials that companies spend millions of dollars to show for not even a full minute. When we sat down to watch the 2020 Superbowl, the 49ers vs the chiefs, I was excited to see who was going to win the Superbowl and to see Jennifer Lopez and Sharika’s halftime performance. But, I was also wondering which companies that year would pay so much to have their product advertised. Of course, there were Pepsi ads, Toyota, Budlight but, my Achilles heel is the candy commercials. The people in the advertising business know how to sell candy by the classic close-up of the candy bar but I was surprised to see there was a Reese commercial that took a more comical approach. The Reeses Take 5 commercial is one of the best 2020 Superbowl ads because it’s talking about how no one has heard of the new Take 5 Reeses bar by using popular idioms, or dad jokes, like “Have you been living under a rock” and “ were you born yesterday.” This is a nice change of pace for a candy advertisement. Even though the Reeses Take 5 bar itself is only shown at the beginning of the advertisement, it’s still successful because it’s memorable, has good quality video edits, and the humor targets a broader audience.
The commercial starts in an office setting where employees are working in their cubicles. A woman named Trish then starts eating the Take 5 bar and a co-worker hears her snacking from his seemingly normal desk and asks her “What’s that.” She tells him it’s Reese’s Take 5 bar and then lists the ingredients: chocolate, peanuts, caramel, peanut butter, and pretzels. The co-worker then says, “never heard of it,” and Trish asks him if he had been living under a rock. The camera goes back to the co-worker and his desk and zooms out to see that he does live under a rock. He gets offended by her joke and creeps back under the rock. Trish then continues naming off more idioms and the camera moves to other parts of the office showing people representing those sayings. This is an ingenious idea for a Reese commercial because usually their product being advertised is the center of attention for the entire video. This particular Reese commercial is unique compared to the others.
One of the reasons this commercial was so successful is how unforgettable it is to the audience. The campaign slogan, “The best bar you never heard of”, references the fact that the product has been rebranded to attract new customers. Though the company uses this commercial to explain how unheard of the candy bar is the video is easy to recognize. For Superbowl commercials, companies like to make ads more interesting and memorable than regular ads because they are spending more money to have the commercial viewed. Also, this is Hershey’s first Superbowl ad for the Reese brand. According to S.M. Walsh’s article on Heavy, “Jill Baskin, The Hershey’s Co. CMO, tells Forbes, ‘Candy is a really fun category… Because, unlike many categories, you don’t need to teach anyone anything. You see the product and know what to do with it.’ (par. 6). Walsh’s point is that with candy ads your goal is to sell candy, and with many types of candies out there you need to create something that catches your eye. For example, if you hear someone say “Were you born yesterday”, you might remember seeing the baby typing on a computer in his office.
The editing and special effects of the video are another example of Reese’s accomplishment to rebrand the previously known Hershey’s Take 5 bar. Hershey’s company makes over 8 billion U.S. dollars worldwide in just one year so, they are capable of making a good quality commercial. Since the use of idioms is the reason for special effects and video editing, they had to figure out how to portray each idiom visually. The first thing I noticed was the producer’s way of showing the office. The camera shifts from Trish and after moves to another portion of the office to show her co-workers as each idiom she mentions. An example of a more edited part of the 30-second ad, is the man representing the idiom, “Are you from a different planet?” the man’s face peels down to show a little alien inside. Another example is the co-worker on the back of a moving “turnip truck”, which appeared to be driving through the office. Marty Swant’s Forbes article says, “According to Jill Baskin, The Hershey Co.’s CMO, public awareness of the product has been low despite high rankings by candy bar enthusiasts. She said the spot is meant to be a ‘product demonstration ad’ that allows them to ‘tell someone directly what’s in this bar and why it’s so great-tasting without being boring.” Although Swant does not say so directly, he assumes that the use of special effects for the idioms is Reese's way of making a unique, good quality, and humorous commercial.
Many commercials that are supposed to be humorous, fail because they are often offensive or their selected audience views it as immature. This commercial, on the other hand, targets a wider range of audiences and fortunately isn’t intended to offend anyone. Reese’s entire approach of using idioms wasn’t just to go with their slogan, “the best bar you never heard of”, but also a strategy to poke fun about unawareness of their product. According to Magda Kay’s article titled “ Does humor in advertising help sell more”, she quotes, “But then check CBSnews.com and you will see this: ignore those snobs who say humor has no place in sales and marketing, that prospects don’t buy from clowns, or you should never poke fun at your own brand. They do not understand the likeability factor of humor.” The essence of Kay’s argument is funny ads aren’t portraying their products as a joke, but instead using humor as an emotion toward the company itself and when executed correctly, can create a positive attitude toward the product and company. Thus the use of humor in the advert provides the appeal to a broader audience because idioms are expressions passed down from one generation to the next. For instance, I interviewed my Nonie, mother, and 13-year-old brother to see if they knew the meaning of, “have you been living under a rock”. My Nonie said it means, “ to be sheltered or unaware of something”, and my mother told me it means, “ you’re not with-the-times and clueless.” My brother believes it means, “that you never know what going on in the world.” This proves my point that Reese’s Take 5 commercial does not hone on specific age group.
Back in 2004 when the Take 5 bar was first introduced, the product was named Hershey’s Take5 bar. The first Take 5 commercial was a music video, where they listed all the ingredients in the song and had twenty-year-olds showing off the product. While watching this ad the only thing I can think of is how confused I am. The video starts out by showing a close-up of the candy bar then moves to a perplexing montage of 20-year-olds representing the ingredients. The first time watching this commercial, I was so baffled I wasn’t aware of how to react or feel. Compared to Reese’s Take 5 commercial I have a generalization of a clear beginning and ending, but the Hershey’s Take 5 commercial just left me with more questions than answers. Besides successfully naming the ingredients in the song, the visual representations of each ingredient are where they lost me. For instance, they showed a girl smiling and looked all around her at caramel to present that ingredient on the list. Although the edits were properly added, it complicates the video by overloading each scene. Another thing I noticed was how the music and the people in the commercial make the ad’s suggested audience teenagers and people in their 20’s. I understand now why the new commercial was more successful than the 2004 version. Because Hershey’s company changed the product to the Reese family and fixed the approach of the advertisement the Reese’s Take 5 bar has upped sales by 50%.
In addition to Reese landing their first Superbowl commercial, they took things to the next level by winning a Guinness world record with the candy bar two days before the Superbowl. Mary Ellen Wright’s article states, “During the unveiling, the bar was certified as the largest chocolate nut bar on record. The gigantic Take5 bar, measuring 9 by 5.5 by 2 feet, took five days and 40 Hershey’s employees to make, Globe Newswire reported. The previous chocolate nut bar record, certified Jan. 16 by Guinness, was a 4,728-pound Snickers bar created at Mars Wrigley’s Waco, Texas, plant, according to Food & Wine.” They took the Guinness world record from Mars with the 5,945 pounds Reese’s Take 5 bar.
The first time I saw the Reese’s Take 5 commercial I had no idea that it wasn’t a newly released product, but has been around for about 16 years. Which makes the slogan, “the best bar you never heard”, true for most. To finish my research, I decided to buy the Take 5 bar myself. One of the questions I have been asking myself is, “why did Hershey company even bother rebranding this product instead of just discontinuing?” I went to Walmart on a mission to find the candy bar and after searching the candy aisle and by the registers, I managed to find one Take 5 bar left. I honestly wasn’t expecting too much because I already knew what all the ingredients tasted like. Then I tried it and was impressed. It became clear to me why Hershey’s took the time and money to rebrand this product; The first go-around doesn’t do it justice. Originally the product had a small fan base until the debut of the Superbowl commercial was released and successfully raised attention to the product. The bar was even ranked 4th out of the Ultimate Reese’s candy ranking list of 14 favorite choices. Overall, Reese’s Take 5 commercial effectively reeled in new customers with humor and intrigue with results to show.