TMO Reports - Pepsi Unveils Super Bowl iTunes Commercials

by , 12:10 PM EST, February 2nd, 2005

Five days before Super Bowl XXXIX, U.S. beverage giant PepsiCo Inc. has released one of two commercials for a bottle cap promotion offering Pepsi drinkers chances for a total of 200 million free songs at Apple's iTunes Music store.

The 45 second spot features a number of popular tracks from a series of music genres. The commercial illustrates how winning a free song from the Pepsi iTunes promotion is as easy as opening a bottle of Pepsi. Teenagers are shown opening and closing bottle caps as music starts, stops and reverses to their motions.

The second, 30 second commercial, which is still in production, it a shorter version of the 45 seconds spot, the company told The Mac Observer.

The other two commercials, 45 and 30 seconds in length, are for Diet Pepsi. The 45 second commercial features Sean "P. Diddy" Combs, who unknowingly starts a trend among Hollywood stars and people everywhere after his car breaks down and he hitches a ride to an awards show in a Diet Pepsi truck. Also featured are Eva Longoria of "Desperate Housewives", Carson Daly of "The Carson Daly Show" and Wilmer Valderrama of the "That 70's Show".

Tapping into Apple's iPod marketing?	A DJ spinning Pepsi bottles
Urban kids delighted to find music under the cap	Bringing the message home

The second spot, entitled "Guy Watcher", shows a good-looking guy walking down the street while drinking a Diet Pepsi and catches the attention of a number of admirers, including supermodel Cindy Crawford.

Four new commercials for Diet Pepsi and the Pepsi iTunes promotion will debut during the NFL event, which begins this Sunday at 6:05pm EST, on the FOX television network. The spots will air in the first and second quarters over a total of two and a half minutes, the company said.

The second annual Pepsi iTunes "under-the-cap giveaway" began Monday and runs through April 11. Caps of Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, Mountain Dew and Sierra Mist bottles offer a one-in-three chance of a free song or a one-in-six chance of a free pepsi product when another identical product is purchased. Holders of winning caps can go to the iTunes Web site and download a song. That, in turn, enters the song winner in a sweepstakes for the iPod Minis.

The Pepsi iTunes spots are being created by TBWA/Chiat/Day in Los Angeles. BBDO in New York typically handles Pepsi ads, but Apple CEO Steve Jobs insisted the commercials be produced by TBWA/Chiat/Day, according the Ad Age magazine. The firms chief creative officer is Lee Clow, who created the "1984" Super Bowl commercial for Apple.

Bryan Chaffin contributed to this article.