“Apple Inc.’s 1984 TV commercial was named the best Super Bowl spot in the game’s 40-year history, a Florida communications company [BCCI] said Wednesday. The Jan. 22, 1984, commercial aired in the third quarter of Super Bowl XVIII, launching the Macintosh personal computer,” UPI reports.
Apple – 1984:
UPI reports, “The commercial, which aired only once, was the best on the basis of impact, sales and viewer memorability, said Bob Circosta, president of [BCCI]. The second-best commercial was Anheuser-Busch Cos. 1989 Bud Bowl, Circosta said. The computer-animated spot featured Budweiser bottles playing a football game against Bud Light bottles. Those two commercials managed to transcend marketing and actually became staples of our American culture, Circosta said.”
Full article here.
In June 1999, TV Guide ran a cover story on the “50 Greatest Commercials of All Time.” Apple’s “1984” ad was #1 on the list. TV Guide wrote:
“With a single airing during Super Bowl XVIII, ‘1984’ did more to change the way ads are created and viewed than any commercial in years. It was not the most heartwarming spot nor a big laugh getter, but it turned a little-known brand into a household name and set a new commercial standard for production values and cinematic style. ‘1984’ also raised the financial stakes: Apple spent a then-outlandish sum of $400,000 to produce the ad and $500,000 to air it; 15 years later, a minute of Super Bowl time costs $3.2 million. Lee Clow, then executive creative director of Chiat/Day, recalls that ‘1984’ almost debuted during a lowlier college bowl game. ‘We had to make a last-minute switch to the Super Bowl because Apple wanted to air the ad closer to the date when the product would actually be available for sale,’ he says. ‘Funny how something that simple could have changed a big piece of advertising history.”
Did you know that Apple’s “1984” commercial, widely credited with starting the Super Bowl advertising craze, actually aired twice? The actual first airing was on a small U.S. local station — KMVT-TV (Twin Falls, Idaho) on December 15, 1983 in the 1:00am sign-off slot — in order for the spot to qualify for 1983 advertising awards.
Apple remastered the famous spot to add in an iPod and showed it at MacWorld Expo in January 2004. “We couldn’t resist,” said Apple CEO Steve Jobs:
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