Time for another look at award winning radio commercials — spotlighting the good and the bad.
This was the $100,000 Grand Prize Winner in the 2009 Radio Mercury Awards.
The First Motel 6 (Santa Barbara, California)
Motel 6 had an interesting challenge: Get people to pay active attention to a message that hasn’t changed in 20 years.
It works. The message hasn’t changed, but the fresh packaging encourages us to revisit it and reinforces the warm, “just folks” approach they’ve always used.
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Motel 6? Over 20 years shoveling the same simple message with the same folksy voice? Is this really any good? Hell, yes! I’ve been banging the drum for this campaign for years. It is living proof of what a radio advertiser can accomplish without being overly clever and without being sell-y. I’ve written extensively about how this campaign is iconic and should be regarded by radio advertisers as a yardstick by which to judge their own advertising. When they hired Tom Bodett, they told him it was because, “You sound like a guy who would stay at Motel 6.” In the beginning, they advised Motel 6 to not run their advertising for 8 months–waiting until every Motel 6 could live up to the promise of the advertising. And when it did run, at a time when there was a glut of motel rooms nationwide, it reversed an occupancy voice virtually overnight. This campaign is the “IT.” Thank you, Dan.
nice…
Great Lesson for all clients. If it ain’t broke ….
Great campaign!
I can sum up this spot in one word: brilliant.