Ads We Love: Arby's & Pepsi

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Sometimes saying you're sorry can be fun...

 
 

From: Arby's | Ad Firm: Fallon

Why it's cool?

Actor Ving Rhames's amazing voice and near indignation in his delivery.

Why we love it?

As with the Badger Car Salesman or Founders Brewing, we love ads that confront problems head on with 100% honesty. In this case, Arby's forgot to fulfill their contractual obligation with a strategic business partner, Pepsi. They didn't just say they were sorry behind closed doors and rushed out a make up ad for it where no one watching it would know what was really happening. They went out of their way to make sure Pepsi knew they were sorry by 'fessing up in public.

And, with Pepsi's blessing, they found a way to make a public apology on brand and on message. They made themselves a brand you can trust because you know they won't fail to take responsibility when they mess up. That's almost as refreshing as an ice cold Pepsi.

What can you learn from it?

Don't be afraid to admit you messed up as a brand. Everybody's human. Everybody makes mistakes. Brands are just large collections of people selling a product or service. Even the group can have a collective 'whoopsie'.

Another great example of this is Domino's. They had a number of years of poor quality and lax standards. They made a monumental effort to turn things around. But had they done that quietly, very few people would know about it. Many would continue to think that Domino's was still terrible. Instead, they boldly told everyone of their shortcomings and what they were doing to fix it. As a result, they experienced rapid revenue growth in the last two years.

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Patrick Kirk

No one knows the exact day Patrick Kirk was born, because he was carried into town by a pack of wild coyotes, but the end of March seems to have some consensus built around it. The townsfolk hadn’t much need for a coyote-raised wild boy seein’ as they already had a town idiot. So, they set Patrick off with the next traveling circus that rolled through town. It was there that the young boy learned of books and math and writing and other cultural offerings from Martha, the kindly old bearded lady, and her husband, Harold, the world’s tallest midget. In between shows, he would explore each new town, never having the chance to make friends with children his age, mostly because they didn’t speak coyote… However, it was on one such trek in his later teen years that Patrick happened upon a small cinema playing an engagement of Major League II. From then on, he knew that he must dedicate his life to motion pictures. The members of the circus were sad to see him go, some angry calling cinema ‘beneath them’, but Patrick took his leave and headed off to university to study the filmic arts. Over nearly half a decade of study, Patrick learned from notables such as Fritz Kiersch, director of Children of the Corn, and Gray Fredrickson, producer of the Godfather Trilogy. Patrick has worked locally in the Oklahoma City market as a grip, camera operator, and editor. He has directed a number of short films and commercial projects and aspires to do more. When not in the editing suite or on set, Patrick can be found relaxing at local sporting events or playing a round of golf. He is particularly fond of poker and has been known to frequent the local casinos. Patrick also experiments with cooking and can make a mean batch of tacos. Among things he still would like to accomplish, Patrick hopes to fly to the moon one day and get into an old fashioned pistols at dawn duel; preferably both at the same time.