More than 70 undergraduate students in Texas Christian University’s Neeley School of Business and Bob Schieffer College of Communications were selected by USA Today’s Ad Meter to watch Super Bowl LIX commercials, provide their feedback and rate the top five and bottom five commercials.
February 19, 2025
By TCU Neeley School of Business
Over the years, the NFL Super Bowl has expanded its connection with fans beyond the football game and halftime performance. It’s also about the commercials, which had an audience of more than 127 million viewers this year. For students considering a career in advertising, communications or marketing, analyzing the decision making that goes into committing $8 million for a 30-second commercial is an opportunity to extend those classroom discussions into real-life, professional scenarios.
Texas Christian University students were selected to rate the Super Bowl LIX commercials by USA Today’s Ad Meter, the industry’s leading rating system gauging the public’s sentiment on Super Bowl commercials. This is the 37th Ad Meter and TCU was one of 13 universities chosen to integrate marketing and strategic communication students’ feedback in the ratings.
The USA Today story profile about TCU published this week, and Ad Meter Editor Rick Suter wrote that TCU students provided a “mix of opinions that produced some of the most comprehensive breakdowns of the Big Game spots.”
To rate the commercials, the students registered for the Ad Meter where they watched and rated this year’s commercials a few days before the football game and up to midnight on Super Bowl Sunday. Students scored each commercial on a scale of one to five and provided feedback with Ad meter team members during class discussions.
C. Kevin Smith, a Neeley adjunct professor and former FOX Sports executive, worked with Katelyn Ackerman (Jennings) ’17, a Gannet/USA TODAY Network client strategist, to bring the opportunity to campus. Ackerman is also a former student in Smith’s sports and entertainment marketing class.
Ackerman and Suter joined the marketing and strategic communication students via Zoom shortly after the Super Bowl to discuss the commercial ratings and solidify the student’s top and bottom picks. In addition to Smith’s class, students in new media classes taught by Catherine Coleman, professor and chair of strategic communication, and Megan Korns Russell, adjunct professor in strategic communication and executive director for TCU Neeley’s external relations department.
One consistent top commercial across all three classes was the Lay’s “The Little Farmer.”
"The spot connected back to the product, unlike many commercials that tell stories yet have nothing to do with their product. So, when I remember the Little Farmer, I always remember it’s Lay’s," said Avery Kisner, a senior majoring in marketing and management.
For Sophia Richards, a junior majoring in strategic communication, the “When Sally Met Hellman’s” commercial offered a “great target reach for Gen X and Millennials who have seen “When Harry Met Sally,’ while still connecting with Gen Z by featuring Sydney Sweeney.
On the opposite end, a commercial that fell into the bottom ratings with was the Hims & Hers “Sick of the System” for weight loss medication.
“Hims & Hers didn’t resonate. A vast majority of students in our generation care about health,” said Layton Fielder, a senior marketing and entrepreneurship major. “This pharmaceutical ad felt disingenuous and the wrong way to go about it.”
A commercial rated in the bottom by all three classes of TCU students was Coffee mates’ “Foam Diva” largely due to the off-putting image of a dancing tongue. According to Suter, others felt the same because the commercial finished 55th out of 57 commercials in the Ad Meter ratings.
The top commercial based on all of the ratings submitted through Ad Meter was Budweiser’s “First Delivery” with a Clydesdale foal who is told he’s too little to make deliveries using a wagon, but proves them wrong.
While viewing some of the commercials during Smith’s class period, students dressed in purple TCU gear, adorned Mardi Gras beads and wore orange mitts in recognition of the NFL officials who stand on the sideline of the football field wearing orange gloves or sleeves to signal timeout for television commercials.
In total, 13 colleges or universities were chosen to participate in the 2025 USA Today Ad Meter. In addition to TCU, the schools included Bentley University, Coastal Carolina University, Franklin College, Marist College, Michigan State University, Middle Tennessee State University, Suffolk University, Texas Tech University, Tulane University, University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, Virginia Commonwealth University (Brandcenter), and Xavier University of Louisiana.
“Moving forward, our future marketing graduates better understand the reason for seeking out the evidence and becoming critical thinkers as they attempt to justify the spend for sports (advertising),” Smith said. “Plus, this process invited students to put their recommendations in context of a bigger picture – and beyond their own agenda or personal opinions as marketers.”
