Rob Riggle Is the Guac Guru In Avocados From Mexico’s AI-Powered Super Bowl Play

Rob Riggle is a former lieutenant colonel in the Marine Corps, a stand-up comedian, writer, actor, podcast host, and even a jet pilot. But one thing he is not known for is his culinary skill. “I’m not the best cook,” he told Us magazine in 2020.

Starting today, Riggle will remedy that with a sweeping store of guacamole recipes. Or, at least, an AI version of him will.

In the run up to Super Bowl LX, Avocados From Mexico has debuted a digital platform called the Predictive Pit, where visitors can interact with Riggle’s avatar, known in this setting as the “Guac Guru.” The robed, mystic figure with Riggle’s face will furnish them with a guacamole recipe while also predicting game results.

According to Avocados from Mexico CEO Alvaro Luque, research has shown that people want ideas for how to entertain with different kinds of guacamole. “So we’re using technology—using Rob Riggle and AI and predictions—to give them guacamole recipes for the game,” he said.

The Predictive Pit prompts visitors to enter their name, home city team, and the type of prediction they’d like Guac Guru to make. Armed with the latest game-play intelligence, Guac Guru can not only talk about the Big Game on February 8, but playoff action happening right now.

Beginning with the final four playoff games, an added live feature will invite visitors to match their own predictions against the Guru’s for a chance to win a year’s worth of avocados.

Having hosted Fox NFL Sunday’s popular Riggle’s Picks, Riggle is comfortable with soothsaying. But the AI-powered version of him is especially prescient, since it uses real-time stats via SportsDataIO.

“On the back end, there’s lots of things going on—pulling sports data, rendering videos in real time, customizing it, cloning the voice of Rob with his digital avatar, and giving you a game-day winning recipe tied to your team,” said Kristian Bottini, CEO of 270B, the agency that created the platform.

While Avocados From Mexico is luring football fans with the promise of free predictions and guac recipes, Luque doesn’t mince words when it comes to Predictive Pit’s purpose: “We want to sell more avocados,” he said. That’s why the company is releasing its campaign early: “If we have a full month to do it, it’s going to be great for us to build up consumption,” he added.

It’s no surprise, then, that the guru’s true gift is mashing as many avocado references into the script as possible. 

“I’m tuning in with the guac!” proclaimed the guru on a recent trial run. “This prediction is coming in with extra jalapenos today. After I give you a prediction, I’ll give you a guac recipe. Stick around. Guac is always a good play!”

From air time to AI

This is Avocados From Mexico’s third AI-powered activation for the Super Bowl. Last year, it invited fans to huddle with an AI-rendered Rob Gronkowski, who shared recipes including his Buffalo Gronkamole.  In 2024, it rolled out GuacAImole, which guac recipes based on ingredients or food photos that users uploaded. Together, these two efforts drew 2 million views and raised engagement by double digits.

The last time that the commodity-marketing organization ran a traditional Super Bowl ad was 2023. It was a Garden of Eden sendup starring Anna Faris, who bit into an avocado instead of an apple.

Why the departure? “After the Anna Faris ad, we started shifting our strategy to reinforce the presence of the brand in football in general, not only to one single event,” Luque said. “We shifted funds to try to become a bigger player in the college football arena, and then came back to the Super Bowl through technology.”

He added: “We would still like to go back to the Super Bowl as an advertiser, but using technology and AI has been very good for us.”

Yet for all the potential that AI is bringing to advertising, it’s not without its risks. Consumers laughed but brands shuddered when, in a much-publicized 2024 snafu, Google’s AI Overviews recommended that people “eat at least one small rock per day” and “add about ⅛ cup of non-toxic glue” to pizza sauce “to give it more tackiness.”

Bottini explained that Guac Guru has been trained only to talk about football, and the sole prompt the user gets is entering their name. “Every time we develop AI tech, especially when you’re dealing with celebrities, you have to put barriers and guardrails so [bad] experiences don’t happen,” he said.