879 articles · page 18 of 19
JR東海 | 会うって、特別だったんだ。 | 2022
In 1988, Eri Fukatsu waited on a station platform for her boyfriend. In 2022, she had become a businesswoman taking the bullet train to Osaka on a work trip. JR Central quietly captured these 33 years of change in just 60 seconds.
キリン | 企業広告「応援する者」篇 | 2014
This commercial, released on June 2, 2014, covers everything from a birth to Shinji Kagawa pulling on the national team's number 10 jersey, all in just two minutes. Only two minutes. But every single second of it is packed with feeling. You might think, what a luxury to tell a story this way—but then again, maybe you need exactly this kind of luxury to get this far. At the edge of the frame, always in the eyeline of whoever is sending their support, is the back of a boy's head, his back, slowly growing up. That's why it's so easy to feel for him.
花王 | 洗濯愛してる会 | 2019
In January 2020, right at the start of the new year, I got hit with a shock strong enough to make me want to restart this blog. Five of the hottest actors around — Matsuzaka Tori, Suda Masaki, Kaku Kento, Mamiya Shotaro, and Sugino Yosuke — talking about laundry with total seriousness for 60 seconds. It felt like I'd just watched two whole dramas.
Spotify | New Music, New Me | 2016
Mom is chopping scallions in the kitchen. That's all there is to it — but set it to Takkyu Ishino's techno, and the whole world changes.
Donate Life America | The World's Biggest Asshole | 2017
Coleman F. Sweeney is the biggest jerk in town. He pees while driving and tosses it out the window, shoots the neighbor's dog with a paintball gun, steals candy from kids on Halloween. But he was an organ donor.
湖池屋 | スゴーンなダンス | 2017
Do you remember that ballroom dance commercial Masahiko Sato made back in 1988? With its catchy jingle, it was a legendary ad that swept through the era on rhythm and nonsense. Now, 29 years later in 2017, Koikeya launched an upgraded snack called "Sugo-n," and that very commercial came back to life in the 21st century, done up with EDM music and lightning-fast footwork dancing.
Xbox | Life is Short, Play More (Champagne) | 2002
A baby born in a delivery room bursts straight through the window, flies into the sky, ages before your eyes, and crashes into a grave. 52 seconds. In 2002, this one film shook all of Europe.
TVE | SUITCASE | 1989
In 1989, Spain's national TV station aired a commercial telling people not to watch too much TV. And it was the TV station itself that put it out.
BANCO POPULAR DE PUERTO RICO BANK | THE MOST POPULAR SONG | 2012
Puerto Rico's biggest hit song was a tune called "I Don't Do Anything" — a song that nationally celebrated not working. This campaign got the very people singing it to rewrite it. That bold move brought Puerto Rico its first-ever Cannes Grand Prix.
MERCADO LIVRE | CALL OF DISCOUNTS | 2025
You're watching a game stream, and suddenly Neymar is a chair. More precisely, it's time to find the Neymar disguised as a chair, and however long it takes to find him decides how big the discount on that chair gets. It sounds completely absurd, but the results actually followed through.
UN LIVE, SPOTIFY | SOUNDS RIGHT | 2025
On Earth Day 2024, a brand-new artist called "NATURE" showed up on Spotify. Ocean waves, birdsong, the rustle of a rainforest. Every time one of her songs gets played, she earns royalties, and that money goes straight into conservation. The campaign was built by UN Live and Spotify together with AKQA Copenhagen, and it won the Grand Prix in the Innovation category at Cannes in 2025.
BUDWEISER | ONE SECOND ADS | 2025
The very first note is all it takes to know the song. That feeling every music fan has was turned straight into an ad. Budweiser's "ONE SECOND ADS," an ad from Brazil, won the Grand Prix in the Audio & Radio category at Cannes Lions 2025.
SPCA | DRIVING DOGS | 2013
Dogs driving a car. Sounds like a joke, but they actually pulled it off. To prove that shelter dogs are smart, they went this far.
PHILIPS | REFURB (Better Than New) | 2024
Stop selling new products, and sell only repaired ones instead. That's the decision Philips made, and it won a Grand Prix at Cannes Lions. This isn't a story about a clever ad idea — it's about changing the way a company actually sells things.
VODAFONE | Between Us | 2015
Some ads are designed to never be found. This is the story of a secret app built to protect women in Turkey from domestic violence.
COMMERCIAL RESIDENCE | House of Clicks | 2016
200 million. That's a staggering number. But it wasn't just a number. Etched into all those countless clicks was the shape of the house that two million Swedes dreamed of. They took that data and turned it into bricks and mortar, actually building a real house out of it. It might be the most romantic use of big data you'll ever see.
SCE | The Prevention Grid | 2022
The era where advertising companies make more than just ads has truly arrived. Deloitte Digital built an AI and AR-powered wildfire prevention system for a power company called SCE. It won Gold at Cannes Lions 2022—and this was Deloitte's first-ever Gold Lion, which makes it a real milestone for the industry.
BANCO BAMERINDUS | THE FRUSTRATED MAN | 1976
It's 1976. Brazil's Banco Bamerindus put out a film called "THE FRUSTRATED MAN." Just that title alone makes you feel like something's about to happen.
KELLOGG’S CORP | Slackers | 1999
It's 1999. Kellogg's teamed up with JWT New York and won a Gold for a film. Its title was "Slackers."
VIRGINIA GIUFFRE | THE LEGACY OF VIRGINIA GIUFFRE | 2026
An ad that isn't an ad won the biggest prize at the world's largest advertising festival. Zero budget, no film—just articles and interviews. This is the story of one PR person who carried on her late client's fight for a full year.
HEAD & SHOULDERS | 100% Kosher Head & Shoulders | 2016
They bought up the entire domestic stock of Passover cleaning kits and slipped dandruff test strips inside. An ad that uses a religious ritual as its medium — you really don't see that every day.
HBO | Big Love Audio Mural Installations (Wall of Secrets) | 2009
Painted on a city wall, passersby had real headphone jacks embedded right in their heads. Plug in, and you'd hear that one person's own "secret" whispered in your ear.
COINBASE | Less Talk, More Bitcoin | 2022
Just a QR code bouncing around the screen, for 60 seconds. No celebrities, no narration, no product explanation. At the Super Bowl, the pinnacle of advertising, Coinbase chose to do "nothing."
SANDY HOOK PROMISE | Back to School Essentials | 2020
A cheerful back-to-school shopping scene slowly turns into a nightmare over 66 seconds. Binders and shoes are, for American kids, just tools to survive school — and this ad hits you with that reality when you least expect it.
VOLKSWAGEN | The Force | 2011
A kid dressed as Darth Vader racked up 15 million views on YouTube and became one of the most beloved ads in Super Bowl history.
NSPCC | Ventriloquist | 2005
"What's 9 times 8?" The one who answers is a ventriloquist sitting behind a little girl. No one notices him at all. I still get chills watching this 70-second film NSPCC made back in 2005.
AMERICAN HONDA MOTOR | PROJECT DRIVE IN | 2014
You need a car to go to a drive-in theater. That point is so obvious nobody ever says it out loud, but Honda took it seriously.
カロリーメイト | 狭い広い世界で | 2024
Through the screen of a smartphone, someone had been watching a whole year in the life of a student preparing for exams. The 2019 song "Boku no Koto" gets a new orchestral arrangement, and all three members of Mrs. GREEN APPLE even make cameo appearances.
YUBARI RESORT | NO MONEY BUT LOVE | 2009
How do you advertise a city that collapsed under 35 billion yen in debt? Normally, you can't. So this city didn't hide the impossible—it just said it out loud. NO MONEY BUT LOVE. No money, but love.
John Lewis | Man On The Moon | 2015
The yearly John Lewis Christmas ad. Just the fact that it's something to look forward to as the weather turns cold already makes it a winner, but the way it consistently exceeds expectations feels almost miraculous.
TERRES DES HOMMES | SWEETIE | 2014
A 10-year-old girl identified 1,000 sex offenders in 10 weeks. But she doesn't exist. She's a fully computer-generated virtual girl. This is the story of an ad agency that launched its own criminal investigation.
T-MOBILE | Welcome Home | 2011
In 2010, at the arrivals hall of Heathrow Airport, tired passengers walked out to find 300 people suddenly bursting into song. A choir that recreated even the sound of instruments using only their voices turned the cold, impersonal arrivals hall into a celebration in an instant.
BURGER KING | WHOPPER SACRIFICE | 2009
Delete ten friends on Facebook and you get a free Whopper. The person you deleted gets a notification saying 'You have chosen a Whopper over your friend.' It was a bomb CP+B dropped in 2009.
MONTEFIORE | CORAZON - GIVE YOUR HEART | 2018
Shoot a 48-minute film, then wrap up donor registration in just 15 seconds. That's what Montefiore Medical Center pulled off. Audiences leaving the theater held their phone to their chest, the poster woke up, and registration was done. It won the Grand Prix in the Health & Wellness category at Cannes in 2018.
ROCKET | Own the Dream | 2025
The moment the Super Bowl commercial ended, 65,000 people in the stadium started singing. Millions of people watching on TV hummed along too. It wasn't the commercial, and it wasn't the halftime show—it was a 15-second live singalong that slipped right into the broadcast. Both the NFL and FOX had initially said it couldn't be done.
VOLVO | INTERCEPTION (The Greatest Interception Ever) | 2015
Hijacking the Super Bowl without paying the $4.5 million entry fee. The moment rivals poured $60 million into their own ad slots, Volvo was trending worldwide on Twitter. This is the Cannes Grand Prix winner.
WARNER BROS | WHY SO SERIOUS? | 2009
This is the story of a movie promotion that turned into a city-wide game lasting 15 months. From 2007 to 2008, fans around the world became "residents of Gotham City," solving puzzles, making phone calls, and picking up cakes.
BAOBEIHUIJIA | Search for Free WiFi, Search for Missing Children | 2015
What if the WiFi network you were about to connect to was named "Help, Find Me"? In China, more than 200,000 children go missing every year, and this was the answer TBWA/Shanghai came up with.
Vi (Vodafone Idea) | Guardian Beads | 2026
Maha Kumbh Mela draws 500 million pilgrims, and every day 5,000 people go missing. When they bathe, phone numbers written on their palms simply wash away. Vi came up with a way to turn family phone numbers into something people wear instead — a string of prayer beads.
ADIDAS | Impossible is Nothing - The Long Run | 2004
In old footage from 1974, Muhammad Ali is running in Zaire. Beckham and Zidane run alongside him, catching up. Today's athletes are joining footage that should have been long dead.
花王 メリット | 家族と愛とメリット | 2024
The concept and art direction here are just incredible. You can really feel a great team meeting a great client. I ended up buying Merit shampoo, hook, line, and sinker.
Colgate | Not Every Smile Starts as a Smile | 2025
A toothpaste ad showing kids crying and throwing tantrums, side by side. Instead of the perfect family photo, it shows the real struggle of getting kids to brush their teeth.
Joburg Ballet | Breaking Ballet | 2018
A lot of millennials saw ballet as old-fashioned. Swan Lake and Shakespeare are wonderful, sure, but to young people in Johannesburg, it felt like "an art form that has nothing to do with me." To flip that perception, a ballet company did something bold: it turned the trends on social media themselves into ballet.
Coors Light | Coors Lights Out | 2023
In August 2023, a foul ball from Shohei Ohtani smashed an LED module on a Coors Light sign at Citi Field. A black dot of missing pixels appeared right above the can. Normally this would end with a quiet "sorry, we'll fix it," but Rethink turned it into a commemorative can recreating that black square — released just 48 hours later. It's reaction marketing at its finest.
森永製菓 ダース | 祝25周年篇 | 2018
This is what 15 seconds can do. The only thing they really want to say is "DARS turns 25." If it also happens to get across that "December 12 is DARS Day," that's a lucky bonus. But they don't explain how tasty it is, or how many pieces are in a box, or anything like that. And I think that's exactly right.
APPLE | Escape from the Office | 2022
A 9-minute ad. Apple made one in 2022, and it even won the Film Grand Prix at Cannes. It's now in MoMA's permanent collection, too. I watched the whole 9 minutes, start to finish.
サントリーBOSS | 働くって、いいもんだ。THE LAST TRAIN | 2017
This is the story of a surprise staged for a station manager's retirement, at Akihabara Station after the last train had gone. On a platform where no one should have been at that hour, his coworkers were waiting for him. Just imagining someone close to you reaching their "last shift" is enough to bring tears to your eyes.
BURGER KING | CONFUSING TIMES | 2020
2020 was a year when everyone felt confused. Burger King made a radio ad that put that exact feeling of confusion into words—things like catching a sneeze with your elbow, then high-fiving with that same elbow. And the twist is, it was actually an ad for the Impossible Whopper, which tastes like meat but isn't meat. Presenting confusion as confusion, honestly, turned out to be the most honest approach of all.