“Consumers are smarter than sometimes brands give them credit for,” Gabor added. “A lot of people perceived [the ad] to be just manipulative guilt marketing.”

In fairness, while 64% of viewers didn’t like the ad, 12% did, according to data from ad tech firm Nexxen. And Nationwide stated that “thousands” of consumers visited its Make Safe Happen site.

But Nationwide hasn’t returned to the Big Game since.