Psst! Schnucks Has a Secret

Do you remember the annoying ads for Schnucks Super Soda from the early 90s?

Brother Mark works in advertising for Schnucks.  Introducing Super Soda was one of his first big projects. I ran across a tape he sent me of the series years ago and asked him to tell me the back story of how the ads were shot.

10-second tease

This 10-second tease that was rolled out to generate buzz may refresh your memory. I’ll run the rest of the series later, along with his description of the challenges of shooting it.

Warning: if you are susceptible to ear worms, you may want to turn the sound off before you listen to the whole batch of them at one time.

Commercial about the runs didn’t run

I did production stills on a three-day commercial shoot once. I gained a real appreciation for the way they could use basic lighting special effects to make a plain room look interesting.

I also worked with a crew shooting an anti-diarrhea medicine ad in our newsroom. (They said ours was the only newspaper in South Florida that didn’t look like an insurance company.)

It’s mind-boggling how they can spend all day for a 15 or 30-second spot (that didn’t run, in the case of the product that was supposed to cure the runs).