Negotiated Reading of the Super Bowl LIII Budweiser Commercial

On February 3, 2019, in the 4th quarter of Superbowl LIII, the Anheuser-Busch company premiered their commercial promoting their beer, Budweiser.  Simply put the commercial shows a dalmatian with his ears flopping in the wind, sitting atop a beer wagon.  The wagon is pulled by the famous Budweiser Clydesdales.  In one sweeping motion the camera is shown passing through the wheat fields the wagon is riding through and turning to reveal a wind farm in the background.  This all coincides with the song, "Blowin' in the Wind" by Bob Dylan. Then at the end it states that their beer is now brewed with wind power, in hopes for a better tomorrow.

The negotiated reader would find that this commercial was very persuading.  This is because the commercial emphasized the pathos argument beyond anything else.  At least for me, the sweet song coupled with the wagon riding through the wheat fields gave me chills.  All of my family lives in Ohio country and the commercial's cinematics gave me feelings of home and happy memories of being at my grandparents' houses.  Along with the good feelings that it gave me, it also sent a societal message to all those watching the Super Bowl.  This message was about how polluted our Earth has become and if we wish for it to ever look like how it did in the commercial again, we must resort to cleaner methods of energy consumption.  This insight is gained by almost any educated person, as they will know and believe that global warming and the effects of it are becoming increasingly threatening. 

So, it would seem that the above commercial was influential to the negotiated reader because of its emphasis put on the pathos side of argument.  The techniques primarily used to achieve the effect of wanting to buy their product are Viral Marketing and Mash-up.  The Anheuser-Busch company used Viral Marketing in the sense that this was the first time that they had broadcast that they are now brewing their beer with 100% renewable wind electricity.  By doing this they want people to notice the label on their beer that states that it was brewed with 100% renewable electricity and share it.  By putting so much emphasis on this they were practically asking to be fact checked, and therefore they received a lot of good secondary promotion from outside sources, confirming their do-good mission as a reality.  Furthermore, their use of the mash-up between a country paradise and an urban ideal was critical in the commercial's outreach.  By this, it is meant that the country paradise is the first part of the commercial showing the sunset, dog, horses, and wheat fields; to stimulate an American sense of pride.  Then the urban ideal is the portion of the commercial speaking about how they now brew with wind power, for urban settings wish make recompense for their long years of pollution and change to ensure a healthy earth for their kids to live on.

So, for example an average farmer in the Midwest might think that Budweiser is a good beer because of how "American" it is and how great it is that the company provides jobs to people out in the American Midwest (because this is where a majority of wind farms are).  However, a middle class New Englander may believe that Budweiser is a good beer because they are using wind power to brew it.  This is important to him because he lives in a region that is in immediate threat of the effects of global warming.

Works Cited:
thedrum.com
anheuser-busch.com
Wind Never Felt Better