McDonald's Filet-O-Fish ad makes a big splash
— -- People have been hooked by McDonald's Filet-O-Fish singing fish ad.
The fish sings, "Give me back that Filet-O-Fish" as he hangs mounted on a wall plaque in a garage. Two friends watch the fish, but enjoy the sandwich without a word.
The ad and its infectious song have spawned a series of knockoff ads posted online and a ring tone. Google says searches for "McDonald's fish" are up 100% in the past four weeks and that the ad has been viewed on YouTube more than a million times.
"It took a life of its own," says Danya Proud, McDonald's spokeswoman.
The talking fish looks like the "Big Mouth Billy Bass" gag gift advertised on cable TV almost a decade ago. Agency Arnold Worldwide came up with the parody idea after struggling to create an ad local franchisees could air for the Filet-O-Fish promotion that is done every year around this time.
Proud says that McDonald's sells about 300 million fish sandwiches annually, 25% during the 40-day Lenten period before Easter Sunday (April 12 this year).
"It was our third Saturday in a row working in a conference room that's known as the fish bowl," says Peter Harvey, senior copy writer at Arnold in Boston. "We started talking about the toy that everybody had 10 years ago, and it came to us."
Part of the creative challenge was that the actors don't speak, yet had to be funny. Actor Ray Conchado plays the guy who shrugs off the singing fish, while JR Reed is the friend surprised to see a fish singing when he walks into the garage.
"We had to run this in both English and Spanish," Harvey says. "We had to have the actors not speak. If they have to talk to make us crack up, it's not going to work."
That put the pressure on the fish. "The fish was only going to take up 12 seconds, so he had to be fun and catchy really fast," Harvey says.
Once the concept was nailed, they came up with lyrics and music and assigned a music agency to create six or seven versions of the tune that is sung by Joey Auch.
"We wound up choosing the song not because there was a science behind it but because when we heard it the first time we wanted to hear it again," Harvey says.
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