Did Mark Stoops Just Make the Most Awkward Commercial Ever Recorded?
Mark Stoops is a football coach. He’s one of the best to ever lead the Kentucky football program, despite what some may say following a 4-8 2024 campaign. Stoops has more wins than any other Kentucky football coach. That’s pretty good.
Coaching football is just one of the many things Stoops does well. But nobody would ever mistake him for Bob Vila or Billy Mays.
Nevertheless, one thing required of all Power Conference football coaches is cutting commercials for advertisers. The majority of his contract is paid by JMI, Kentucky’s media rights holder, who makes money by selling advertisements. Many of those advertisers want the head coach to promote their products.
The biggest supporter of Kentucky football is Kroger. Its name is on the stadium where the Wildcats play on Saturdays. They are paying approximately $1.85 million per year through the 2028 season. That deal includes some advertisements with the Kentucky head football coach.
To break up the monotony, Kroger brought Mark Stoops to one of their stores. In the one-minute video, the Kentucky head coach shares some of his favorite snacks to pick up at Kroger. The result is one of the most awkward advertisements you’ve ever seen.
One of Stoops’ favorite selections? Hummus. “You can’t go wrong with this!”
To give Stoops a little leniency, name-dropping Private Selection before sharing each choice is a mouthful. Even so, he’s no one-take Tom.
As a person who is often tasked to read ads, I’ve had my fair share of awkward misses. It happens. Still, I can’t stop watching this ad. Every time, there’s something new that makes me giggle. It’s so awkward in so many ways, but it will never be more awkward than Lane Kiffin’s call to action for FAU football fans.
Kiffin claimed that he went out of his way to be as awkward as possible. “We had a really good marketing idea,” Kiffin said.
“If we just do a normal video… nobody’s really going to play that outside of (Boca Raton, Fla.). So let’s do like the worst one ever so everybody will put it on TV and say, ‘Look how bad this is.’ All of the sudden, you’ve got all kinds of publicity for the program. You’ve got people looking up FAU who don’t even know what FAU is. Pretty good, huh?”
If the goal was to get Kentucky football fans to talk about Kroger, mission accomplished for Mark Stoops.
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