In an example that showcases the downside of crowd sourcing, PepsiCo encouraged fans to make a Super Bowl ad and wound up offending some Catholics.
The company got some flak for an ad that appeared on its website that some thought endorsed replacing communion wafers and wine with Pepsi Max and Doritos. The maker of the ad, a Philadelphia firm called Media Wave Productions, however, says that interpretation is way off base.
The ad, which has been taken off Pepsi’s website and YouTube, features a pastor who is losing his flock, so he prays and hears the sound of crunching and soda pouring. “Got it,” he answers. The next shot shows dozens of people of various denominations at the church lined up to get Doritos and Pepsi Max.
After Media Wave submitted the ad in early November, a number of Catholic groups, including one called America Needs Fatima, took issue with the ad, which the group believed mocks the Holy Eucharist. That group started an online petition to ask Pepsi to reject the ad.
Pepsi eventually did. When the 10 finalists for the contest were chosen on January 3, the ad, called “Feed Your Flock,” was not among them. Pepsi rep Lindsay Anthony apologizes to anyone who had taken offense. “The video was not created by Doritos or Pepsi MAX and was one of over 5,600 entries we received,” says Anthony. “With such a significant number of submissions, you get a pretty wide range of concepts. We apologize to anyone that was upset or offended by this consumer submission.”
Dave Williams, president of MediaWave, says he pulled the ad from Pepsi’s site and from YouTube. “We felt bad,” he says. “Our intention was to win, not to offend.”
The Pepsi contest, now in its fifth year, dangles $1 million if one of the ads tops USA Today’s AdMeter, $600,000 for the number-two spot and $400,000 for the third spot. If the Pepsi Max and Doritos ads take the top three positions on that poll, the company will award another $1 million to each, for a total of $5 million.
PepsiCo will choose six winners among the final 10 and run the six ads during the game. The top 10 spots can be viewed here.
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