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Get ready to watch a commercial…again, and again, and again. Lay's is bringing its Groundhog Day game on Friday with similar — but different — ads.
They'll run on ABC Friday, Variety reports.
Lay's to run a series of commercials on Groundhog Day
The segments feature Stephen Tobolowsky going up to the checkout counter. Each time, he brings up a bag of Lay's. However, they're all different each time. He's stuck in a time loop, just like in the Bill Murray movie Ground Hog Day — which also starred Tobolowsky as Ned.
Disney sold one-third of Friday's national advertising on ABC to PepsiCo's Frito-Lay to make way for the eight commercials.
Chris Bellinger, CCO of PepsiCo Foods, U.S., said, “You can buy a ‘view,' but I can't buy a ‘like,' and I can't buy someone saying, ‘Hey, did you see this?' That's worth its weight in gold. That's what we hope to get with this one.”
Friday is, of course, Groundhog Day. So, it makes sense to run clever commercials these days.
“We were out of our minds,” Dan Sanborn, head of marketing for Kimmelot, said. “We were aiming to have fun and put smiles on people's faces and create moments that wouldn't otherwise exist.”
The idea for these commercials was created just two weeks ago. It's thanks to George Dewey, co-founder of Maximum Effort, a marketing agency he co-owns with Ryan Reynolds, the actor. They reached out to Bellinger and pitched the idea. At first, Bellinger thought they were talking about next year (2025), but nope. It was about getting them on-air for Groundhog Day 2024.
If you're a fan of Lay's potato chips, get ready to see them over and over again on ABC this Groundhog Day.
