The Ten Most Memorable Commercials on Philippine TV

I am fea­tur­ing what I think are the 10 Most Mem­o­rable Com­mer­cials to ever grace Philip­pine TV. The choices are based on research (other people’s votes and blog posts of a sim­i­lar topic) and my own recall of the com­mer­cials that I still remem­ber years after I first saw them on TV. There are other com­mer­cials wor­thy of note: Palmolive’s I CAN FEEL IT that brought a young Alice Dix­son to star­dom, The Pure­foods TJ Hot­dogs GOODBYE CARLO, the funny TIDE IS TIDE, the series of com­mer­cials about Lumen and her fam­ily in Surf, Lucky Me with Luis and Edu Man­zano, San Miguel Beer with Fer­nando Poe Jr, the KFC com­mer­cial that had a guy “come out” to his friends, and more recently, the Colt 45 Series on men act­ing like real men. But these ten, to me, stand out.

What are yours?

10. Bear Brand: Lola Let’s Dance (1980’s)
More pop­u­larly known as “the Bear Brand Look at my Mole commercial”

A clas­sic com­mer­cial with a clas­sic theme and clas­sic music. Even the sepia tone is clas­sic. And clas­sic is timeless.

9. SMB Com­mer­cial: Wala Kang Kat­u­lad, Manny (2006)
More pop­u­larly known as “The One with Erik Morales and Manny Pacquiao”

This was a cast­ing coup. It brought two of the best box­ers in the world in Erik Morales and Manny Pac­quiao. It used the story line of Erik Morales’ recent loss to Manny Pac­quiao as back­drop of the com­mer­cial. And made even Erik Morales lov­able for Filipinos.

8. Coke: Kasama Ka (You’re Part of This) (2006)
More pop­u­larly known as “The One with Nikki Gil”

Nikki Gil is singing the song while dis­trib­ut­ing Coke to peo­ple on her way. Made Nikki Gil famous, and gave Coke a brand new face.

7. McDon­alds: First Love (2009)
More pop­u­larly known as that “Hul­ing El Bimbo commercial”

This one is rel­a­tively new but because it uses an old Eraser­heads song, it brought back a lot of mem­o­ries. I think the great genius of the com­mer­cial is in using the song– it simul­ta­ne­ously and instantly catered to the gen­er­a­tion who grew up on Eraser­heads, and the younger ones who did not but can relate to the theme of unre­quited love. And it also helped that at the time the com­mer­cial was shown on tv, the Eraser­heads were going to have their farewell concert.

6. PLDT: Supor­ta­han Taka (2001)
More pop­u­larly known as “The Supor­ta­han Taka commercial”

The Philip­pine Long Dis­tance and Tele­com Com­pany (PLDT) is known for its beau­ti­ful com­mer­cials. I still remem­ber the Jesuit Vol­un­teers Philip­pines com­mer­cial of many years ago. This one is equally dra­matic. I like it because it touches on a very rel­e­vant issue and makes both par­ents and chil­dren pon­der on the impor­tance of relationship.

5. SMB: Sabado Nights (1995)
More pop­u­larly known as “The One with Ina Raymundo”

This com­mer­cial made a really sexy Ina Ray­mundo, sport­ing a full black out­fit and flirt­ing with Paolo Abr­era, an instant star. And tran­si­tioned the beer from the old DOM-ish type crowd that loved it, to the yup­pie crowd in bars.

4. Royal Tru Orange: Man­tika (1986)
More pop­u­larly known as “The One with RJ Ledesma”

This is actu­ally a series of com­mer­cials that starred a young and pre­co­cious RJ Ledesma and made Royal Tru Orange a house­hold name.

3. Coke: The Coke Beat (2003)
More pop­u­larly known as that “Coke Beat ad”

Another pop­u­lar Coke com­mer­cial. Two col­lege girls play­ing the Coke beat. A con­test on prime­time tv, a nation­wide com­pe­ti­tion, and the Coke Beat became part of Philip­pine society.

2. Bench: Sculler (1991)
More pop­u­larly known as that “Richard Gomez Row­ing commercial”

This one is another clas­sic. And it put Bench in the fore­front of the Philip­pine psy­che, while mak­ing Richard Gomez one of the most bank­able and pop­u­lar actors of his era.

1. Jol­libee: Com­ing Home (2006)
More pop­u­larly known as “the one with Aga Muhlach’s family”.

This one is really cool. This break­through ad fea­tures the entire Muh­lach fam­ily — Aga, Andres, Atasha and Char­lene , shar­ing the dif­fer­ent kind of joy brought about by being a com­plete fam­ily dur­ing Christmas.

What more can we wish for?