2022 Wally Awards: Worst TV commercial

Think about this. You're a creative genius at the agency that handles AirBnB. For your punishment, the account exec hands you, just in time for Christmas Winter Holiday, a problem that "only you can solve": create a message that will overcome the negative publicity about guests wrecking hosts' short-term rentals, and persuade them it's safe to list their homes.

So you do some research, maybe some polling or focus group stuff, to find out what people are afraid of. Turns out people are afraid of "strangers". Specifically, people who aren't from the same "community". Most short-term rental homes are owned by racist colonialist white people, who are afraid of renting to, errr, other-complected people.

The evil white supremacists are afraid to rent to black people because those BLM types will trash their homes. And they're afraid that people who they call by a name that rhymes with "lackeys" will leave their homes smelling of curry... or worse. 

What can we say that would overcome this innate fear of The Other. How about showing some of them renting out their own million-dollar homes to some white folks? Nahhhh. How about... well, damn! No matter which races we show, it's gonna be misinterpreted. Political correctness means we can barely mention the fears we're addressing. Even the word "stranger" is verging on the improper, because, as we all know, there are no more "strangers" in the Brandon's Woke America.

Then, rising from somewhere in your subconscious, you remember a grainy old photo which was said to show a... a... a sasquatch, crashing through the brush. Perfectly PC because a sasquatch is obviously (d) none of the above!

And so you pitch, and AirBnB buys this... the winner of the coveted Wally Award for the Worst TV Commercial of the year 2022.

 

If the idea of having a family of sasquatches stay in your house for a week or two doesn't disturb you, you won't agree with our judges' decision, but frankly, Walt et al. found it just plain stupid.

Footnote: Some nigglers may say, rightly, that this commercial has been around for a year. We know that. It was flighted just over a year ago, too late for inclusion in last year's nominations. So we carried it forward, and with the only competition being the numberless commercials showing black bankers, brain surgeons and billionaires, it was an easy winner.