Creative director of greatest advertisement ever made reveals secret to success: “Knowing the rules on what we weren’t allowed to suggest in a beer ad – no sport, bravado, success, or prowess – it had felt like a fun game to try to bend every one of those!”

Pure surf.

I’ll tell you, anytime, and I mean anytime, our wonderful surfing appears in a television commercial it captivates me completely. I’ll stop whatever I’m doing and study to see if shaper is visible on board, if fins are in correctly, if the essence has been captured or poorly appropriated.

Over time, I’ve become somewhat of an authority, maybe the authority, and can say, without fear of contradiction, that the worst is Jeep’s “Surf the World” effort.

The best?

Guinness beer’s 1999 “Surfer.”

It may, in fact, be one of the greatest commercials ever made full stop.

Very iconic and its genius, creative director and writer Walter Campbell, recently explained how it came to be.

The brief spoke cleverly about the audience and making ads that moved Guinness into a broader, more accessible arena. However, it also said: “The Guinness extended pour time shouldn’t be mentioned, as the dwell may well be a potential barrier to a younger demographic.”

I felt clearly that the “pour” was a treasured part of the Guinness experience. I’d seen mates who are devoted Guinness drinkers look at the settling glass with a distinct sense of longing. Wanting the result of the wait and yet wanting the wait at the same time.

Knowing the rules on what we weren’t allowed to suggest in a beer ad – no sport, bravado, success, or prowess – it had felt like a fun game to try to bend every one of those rules but in a way that would still let the story get on air.

And there we have it. “…no sport, bravado, success or prowess…”

Pure surf.

Campbell goes on to discuss the casting, making etc. and worth a read but savor slowly, again, here.