Real Men of Genius
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''Real Men of Genius'' is a series of advertisements, primarily 60-second American radio spots, for
Bud Light Anheuser-Busch, a wholly owned subsidiary of Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV, is the largest brewing company in the United States, with a market share of 45 percent in 2016. The company operates 12 breweries in the United States and nearly 20 in othe ...
beer. The campaign was originally conceived by copywriter Bob Winter and art director Mark Gross and co-created with copywriter Bill Cimino at DDB Chicago. The campaign began in 1998 under the title ''Real American Heroes'' with 12 radio spots. Over 200 installments have been made. In 2001, the radio version was adapted for television in the UK, advertising
Budweiser Budweiser () is an American-style pale lager, part of AB InBev. Introduced in 1876 by Carl Conrad & Co. of St. Louis, Missouri, Budweiser has become a large selling beer company in the United States. ''Budweiser'' may also refer to an unrelat ...
beer instead of Bud Light (Bud Light was not officially distributed in the UK at the time). The six UK TV spots maintained the same one-minute format and ran for about 18 months. In fall 2003, thirty-second versions of three UK TV spots were edited and seven new ads were produced for US television.
Anheuser-Busch Anheuser-Busch Companies, LLC is an American brewing company headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri. Since 2008, it has been wholly owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV (AB InBev), now the world's largest brewing company, which owns multiple glo ...
is reported to have spent $38 million per year
broadcasting Broadcasting is the distribution (business), distribution of sound, audio or video content to a dispersed audience via any electronic medium (communication), mass communications medium, but typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum (radio ...
just the radio version. The singing was done by
Dave Bickler David Bickler (born March 31, 1953) is an American singer, best known as the lead singer for the rock band Survivor from 1978 until 1983, most notably on the #1 U.S. hit "Eye of the Tiger". In addition to his wide vocal range, his trademark l ...
, the lead singer of the band Survivor, known for such songs as "
Eye of the Tiger "Eye of the Tiger" is a song by American rock band Survivor. It was released as a single from their third album of the same name and was also the theme song for the 1982 film ''Rocky III'', which was released a day before the single. The song ...
" from the 1980s. The humorous, yet seriously spoken, commentary was done by voice actor Peter Stacker. Together, they made an appearance on the television show ''WGN Morning News'' and did a Real Men of Genius about the cameraman, which was a parody saying he falls asleep behind the video camera while recording the show.


Sequence

Each sixty-second ad gives mock glorification in the form of a tribute to men in overlooked professions or with humorous or eccentric traits or habits. The language is very
observational Observation is the active acquisition of information from a primary source. In living beings, observation employs the senses. In science, observation can also involve the perception and recording of data (information), data via the use of scienti ...
in style, in part parodying Budweiser's earlier ''This Bud's for You'' campaign. The advertisement is set to 1980s style
anthem An anthem is a musical composition of celebration, usually used as a symbol for a distinct group, particularly the national anthems of countries. Originally, and in music theory and religious contexts, it also refers more particularly to short ...
ic music. The announcer (Pete Stacker) reads the mock tribute
straight Straight may refer to: Slang * Straight, slang for heterosexual ** Straight-acting, an LGBT person who does not exhibit the appearance or mannerisms of the gay stereotype * Straight, a member of the straight edge subculture Sport and games * Str ...
. Humor in part is derived from juxtaposing over-the-top
vocals Singing is the act of creating musical sounds with the voice. A person who sings is called a singer, artist or vocalist (in jazz and/or popular music). Singers perform music (arias, recitatives, songs, etc.) that can be sung with or without ...
sung by
Dave Bickler David Bickler (born March 31, 1953) is an American singer, best known as the lead singer for the rock band Survivor from 1978 until 1983, most notably on the #1 U.S. hit "Eye of the Tiger". In addition to his wide vocal range, his trademark l ...
. Sometimes these vocals are augmented by a female
gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...
-style chorus. In addition to providing humor, the music is an effective
jingle A jingle is a short song or tune used in advertising and for other commercial uses. Jingles are a form of sound branding. A jingle contains one or more hooks and meaning that explicitly promote the product or service being advertised, usually t ...
.


2001/02 redaction and renaming

In mid-2001, Anheuser-Busch ordered another 17 ''Real American Hero'' ads be made. These ads were pulled from circulation after the
9/11 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated Suicide attack, suicide List of terrorist incidents, terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, ...
as mocking American heroism then seemed questionable. The campaign relaunched in 2002 with the title and lyrics changed from ''Real American Heroes'' to ''Real Men of Genius''.


Release and reception

Anheuser-Busch were initially reluctant to air the ads because of their irreverent style. Consumer testing, however, proved them to be very popular. The ads not only received tremendous consumer response, but also won more than 100 awards, including the prestigious Grand Prix for Radio (twice, in 2005 and 2006) as well as Gold and Bronze Lions at the
Cannes International Advertising Festival The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity (formerly the International Advertising Festival) is a global event for those working in creative communications, advertising, and related fields. It is considered the largest gathering of the ...
and, in 2003, a Grand Clio, making it the most awarded campaign in history. The popularity of the series led to many of the commercials being traded on
peer-to-peer Peer-to-peer (P2P) computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads between peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the network. They are said to form a peer-to-peer n ...
file sharing File sharing is the practice of distributing or providing access to digital media, such as computer programs, multimedia (audio, images and video), documents or electronic books. Common methods of storage, transmission and dispersion include r ...
networks and
bootleg recording A bootleg recording is an audio or video recording of a performance not officially released by the artist or under other legal authority. Making and distributing such recordings is known as ''bootlegging''. Recordings may be copied and traded ...
s of the ads being sold on
eBay eBay Inc. ( ) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that facilitates consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales through its website. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 and became a ...
. In 2003, Anheuser-Busch released a collection of 20 ads on CD, titled ''Bud Light Salutes Real Men of Genius, Vol 1'', to be sold in the company's
online store Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of the r ...
. Two additional volumes were released soon after. In 2005, a limited edition compilation combined all prior volumes into one release, ''Bud Light Salutes Real Men of Genius Volumes 1, 2 and 3''. Each volume contained 20 spots. In late 2006, Anheuser-Busch sponsored a comedy tour titled "Real Men of Comedy" starring
John Heffron John Heffron (b. July 19, 1970) is an American stand-up comic. Career John started his comedy career as a student at Eastern Michigan University, skipping night classes to perform stand-up comedy. He got his first gig as an emcee at the Main St ...
,
Joe Rogan Joseph James Rogan (born August 11, 1967) is an American UFC The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) is an American mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion company based in Las Vegas, Nevada. It is owned and operated by Zuffa, a wholly ...
, and Charlie Murphy. This tour featured the announcer (Stacker) and singer (Bickler) performing several of their famous commercials live at the beginning of the show. Stacker and Bickler performed regional versions of the spots to support Budweiser's comedy tour at radio stations and concert-sponsored venues such as
Lollapalooza Lollapalooza (Lolla) is an annual American four-day music festival held in Grant Park in Chicago. It originally started as a touring event in 1991 but several years later made Chicago the permanent location for the annual music festival. Musi ...
.


Demise

While never officially canceled, funding for the ads was cut in June 2008. At the time, Anheuser-Busch denied the cost savings were part of a defense against
hostile takeover In business, a takeover is the purchase of one company (the ''target'') by another (the ''acquirer'' or ''bidder''). In the UK, the term refers to the acquisition of a public company whose shares are listed on a stock exchange, in contrast to ...
from then-competitor
InBev InBev () is a brewing company that resulted from the merger between Belgium-based company Interbrew and Brazilian brewer AmBev which took place in 2004. It existed independently until the acquisition of Anheuser-Busch in 2008, which formed Anheu ...
. In July 2008, InBev successfully purchased Anheuser Busch.


Internet Heroes of Genius

On June 18, 2019, Anheuser-Busch InBev resurrected a new version of the ad campaign for the
social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...
age called ''Internet Heroes of Genius'', which will run on streaming audio platforms. The new series was created by Red Interactive, a division of Endeavor Global Marketing, and the brewer’s in-house agency, Draftline, and feature Brandon Beilis (singing) and Dave Steele (VO).


Stay At Home Humans of Genius

In 2020, Bud Light released the ''Stay at Home Humans of Genius'' series on its Youtube channel. The series consists of four ads.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Real Men of Genius Anheuser-Busch advertising Advertising campaigns American advertising slogans 1998 neologisms