Earlier this month, TurboTax commissioned Talker Research to get some data on how much Gen Z Americans know about income tax filing.

The upshot: They don’t know much.

Nearly 1 in 5 (17%) of the youngsters thought that they could deduct pretty much anything as a business expense; 13% were sure that they didn’t have to declare income so long as it was paid in cash; and 20% thought that students are exempt from taxes completely.

Ignorance on this scale isn’t just eyebrow-raising—it also helps explain TurboTax’s advertising angle in Super Bowl LIX. The tax-prep giant gave America a sneak peek at its forthcoming effort with a teaser, released today.

In the 15-second drama, Issa Rae takes a carboard box erupting with receipts out of her car. She joins a sorry procession of other zombielike Americans battling high winds on their way to—presumably—the local tax-preparation franchise. (Note to H&R Block: this looks like a shot at you guys.)

Seven seconds in, Rae breaks the fourth wall and addresses the camera: “It’s 2025,” she carps, “this is taxes?”

Well, yeah, it is—for about half of us, anyway. An IRS study from 2021 found that 53% of American seek the help of a tax professional for their yearly filings.

But those numbers are changing quickly. The Talker Research figures revealed that nearly a quarter (23%) of Gen Zers file their own taxes. They also hate the process. A separate survey by Cash App found that 54% of young filers admitted that the tax-filing process has brought them to tears.

See an opportunity here? TurboTax has. In late December, the company took the wraps off a new campaign called “Now This is Taxes”—a line that Rae poses as an interrogative in the Super Bowl teaser.

With a creative assist from R/GA, TurboTax kicked off the effort with six spots spotlighting its new AI-enabled tool that allows filers to access a “TurboTax expert [who] does everything for you.” In ideal circumstances, taxpayers can even get the whole miserable process over with inside of two hours.

Quoting a company statement, the campaign “draws a stark line between the time-consuming, manual, and expensive old way of filing taxes without TurboTax, and TurboTax’s modern, convenient, and stress-free offerings.”

Speaking to ADWEEK in December, Intuit VP of consumer marketing Trevor Kelley explained that the Super Bowl—which this year will be 88 days before April 15^th—is a “pivotal point in the tax year.”

“We want some of that bold advertising swagger that comes with the Super Bowl,” Kelley said, “so this is a great opportunity for this campaign.”

Harrison Ford rarely stars in commercials, so when he decides to work with a brand, he has thoughts. And demands.

He’ll take a castle, for starters, to sign on as a spokesman for Scottish whiskey Glenmorangie, the Indiana Jones icon says during a phone call with his beleaguered agent.

“And I’m not doing all that action man sh*t that they want,” Ford says in his trademark growl. “But I will sit by the fire and drink amazing, smooth Glenmorangie single malt whisky.”

So begins “Once Upon a Time in Scotland,” a cheeky global campaign premiering today for the LVMH-owned brand. The cinematic hero spot—which gives a winking insider’s look at celebrity shilling—has a purposely “anti-marketing sensibility,” according to Caspar Macrae, Glenmorangie’s president and CEO.

“It’s a parody of classic tropes of whisky marketing,” Macrae told Adweek. “We’re peeling those back to get to a more authentic story.”

The 60-second video—with its tagline, “Niiiiice,” in Ford’s gravely voice—acts as the setup for a large-scale project and a three-year relationship with the actor. At the center of the effort is a branded content series—12 episodes in all, rolling out through 2025—that sends Ford to Scotland to learn how Glenmorangie whisky is made and meet its architects. 

Low-key hilarity ensues, including the irascible (and charmingly self-deprecating) Ford wearing a kilt, meeting the locals, and learning new vocabulary. There’s also a slight mishap with an antique suit of armor.

New story, new model

Glenmorangie “wanted to focus on the craft, the people, and the process, using our backyard studio in the Scottish Highlands,” Macrae said, noting that its creatives are taking a page from Netflix with the campaign’s bingeable mini-series.

For the collaboration with Ford, Glenmorangie took the rare step of going outside its traditional agency model, handling the project in-house, which “unleashed our creativity,” according to Florent Leroi, CMO.

“We like to innovate and try new ways of storytelling,” Leroi said. “We wanted something entertaining, allowing consumers to follow Harrison on his journey in discovering Scotland and interacting with the staff at the distillery.”

Cast members are real-life employees, not actors, with Ford taking on the role of mentor and informal coach for his distillery artisan co-stars, Leroi said.

With decades of seminal film work on his CV, Ford is having a moment as a recent Golden Globe nominee for the Apple TV+ dramedy Shrinking and a lead role in Yellowstone prequel 1923. He will join the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Red Hulk in the upcoming superhero flick Captain America: Brave New World.

He starred in a popular Amazon Super Bowl ad from 2019, but his commercial list is short.

Joel Edgerton, actor and filmmaker, directs the series as his first major advertising foray, in partnership with the brand’s creative director Justin O’Shea and production agency Bandits. 

‘Off the leash’

Both Ford and Edgerton found it appealing that they would have a wide berth on developing the content, per Glenmorangie, which provided a transcript of a conversation between the two men.

Ford as a tough guy doing macho things like riding horses and flying planes would be too cliche, they said. But poking holes in that persona was fertile ground.

“We had lots of opportunity to noodle around—nobody stopped us,” said Ford, noting that he was glad to “take the piss out of himself.”

“I think it’s fun to not be as structured or ‘strictured’ as a commercial,” he said.

Edgerton said, simply: “They let us off the leash.”

The campaign’s worldwide media plan spans online video, connected TV, out-of-home, experiential and social platforms in key markets such as the U.S., the U.K, Germany, Japan, and South Africa. The first six episodes drop this week, with the rest planned for the coming months.

Coffee Mate is launching its first Super Bowl ad, and it’s tapped a musical icon that’s sure to impress you… much.

Today, the Nestlé-owned, non-dairy creamer brand announced that Shania Twain is the voice behind the brand’s “Foam Diva” commercial, which was produced by Wieden+Kennedy New York for Super Bowl 59.

Twain confirmed the news across her social platforms, along with a full song that she wrote and performed, offering her own personal twist about the fun feelings people get when drinking a Coffee Mate Cold Foam Creamer.

Prepare for the lyrics, “Gimme cold foam! Gimme cold foam! I’m a dancing tongue, and I like the taste of cold foam.”

Along with Twain’s announcement, Coffee Mate debuted the teaser for its Super Bowl ad. In the 10-second teaser, a young man is topping off his beverage with the brand’s cold foam creamer, which results in a foam mustache on his face.

Meanwhile, the tagline, “A little foam a lot of fun,” and the date of the game, 2.9.25, are projected on the screen.

Coffee Mate unveiled the cold foam line—which is reportedly meant to serve as a competitor to Dunkin’ and Starbucks sweet cream foams and has 25% less sugar than other cold foam creamers—back in October, but it’s officially debuting in stores this month, with three products: Italian Sweet Crème Flavored Cold Foam, Nestle Toll House Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie Flavored Cold Foam, and French Vanilla Flavored Cold Foam.

According to Wieden+Kennedy New York, the ad is meant to celebrate “the over-the-top energy of pop divas everywhere.”

Coffee Mate will be joining other brands like Ritz, Bosch, and Instacart, who will be advertising at the Super Bowl for the first time this year.

Not only do beluga whales have Einstein-level IQs, but at least one of the Arctic-dwelling creatures has been blessed with the gift of speech.

That’s according to a comedic 30-second teaser from NerdWallet for its first Super Bowl commercial.

The video, launching today during the NFL Conference Championship games, plays fast and loose with the marine mammal’s skills—through the wonder of CGI—while thoroughly freaking out a whale-watching tourist named Richard.

Putting the spotlight on the highly intelligent animal is “a fitting match for NerdWallet, which is dedicated to helping people make smarter financial decisions,” per the brand and its agency of record, Deutsch.

Unlike some teasers, which can be purposely oblique, the NerdWallet sneak peek indicates where the creative will go for the hero spot, airing during the third quarter of the Big Game on Feb. 9. It has the simple tagline, “Genius coming, 2.09.25.”

Outside the commercial, the brand will continue celebrating beluga whales with a nod to the currently buzzy look-alike trend. In the coming days, those who think they resemble the so-called “canary of the sea” can share photos of themselves to a dedicated website for a chance to win Super Bowl LIX-related prizes.

NerdWallet is partnering with meme king and self-proclaimed beluga look-alike Tank Sinatra for the contest.

Broad reach, light tone

NerdWallet has spent the past several years broadening its reach with such campaigns as “Future You,” a series of cheeky, music-driven spots with a dystopian theme, and a tie-in with Sesame Street’s numbers-obsessed Count character.

For its Super Bowl debut, the brand aims to continue this light-hearted tone, allowing NerdWallet to “show up as an approachable brand in an otherwise daunting category,” per Alison McCoy, vice president of brand marketing.

NerdWallet joins other first-timers for Super Bowl 59 including Totino’s Pizza Rolls, Ritz crackers, Instacart, Coffee Mate, and Häagen-Dazs.

Paramount is setting itself up for a big win in the AFC Championship game.

Today, the company announced that, for the first time, it’s bringing live, shoppable ads to Sunday’s NFL playoff matchup between the Buffalo Bills and the Kansas City Chiefs. To do so, the company is promoting its CBS Sports HQ digital storefront, a second-screen shoppable experience.

Here’s how it works: Using a phone or tablet, viewers can shop the CBS Sports HQ Store and peruse featured products that cater to an NFL-viewing audience. Among the goods, fans can shop for snacks and entertainment, with sports marketing partners like Pepsi coming on to make it happen.

The storefront is run through Shopsense technology. Paramount previously kicked off its Shopsense partnership at the 2024 CMT Music Awards red carpet pre-show and had a Shopsense AI Lens at the MTV VMAs.

According to Paramount Advertising, unlike previous QR code experiences, the CBS Sports HQ Store activation is all bout immediate fulfillment as it looks to drive results for participating brands and companies.

The goal of the live sports activation is to make a frictionless experience, according to the company. Additionally, shoppable activations for the CBS Sports HQ Store will run during commercial inventory, much like Paramount has done in its other marquee programming, such as its NFL Thanksgiving game. 

The company has a history of success with introducing interactive ads during major sports matchups, previously partnering with Innovid for interactive ads in Super Bowl 58. During the game, Paramount+ ran its first-ever “Add to Watchlist” interactive ads to promote content including Ghosts, Halo, The Chi, Tracker, Fire Country, Family Stallone, Lioness, The Tiger’s Apprentice, and Mission Impossible 7.

At the time, Paramount+’s interactive ads outpaced expectations, coming in at 6% higher than Innovid’s benchmarks.

You can see the NFL AFC Championship on Sunday, Jan. 26, at 6:30 p.m. ET on CBS and its streaming platforms.

Influencer marketing platform ShopMy has raised $77.5 million in a Series B funding round.

ShopMy connects creators with brands to facilitate affiliate marketing partnerships. Creators use ShopMy’s links to share products with their followers, and earn commission when they purchase trough those links.

Its technology automates the process of sending free products to creators in exchange for content. Advertisers can also track sales from creator campaigns through ShopMy, bringing key visibility into a channel where measurement is still a challenge.

“By combining the authenticity of creator content with the precision of performance marketing,
we’re empowering brands to transform creator partnerships into a scalable performance
engine,” said Harry Rein, ShopMy’s co-founder and CEO, in a statement.

More than 100,000 creators earning commissionable revenue through the platform, and they see an average return on investment of 5x, according to ShopMy. Creators Arielle Charnas, Nam Vo, and Justin Anderson are on ShopMy’s platform.

Meanwhile, 550 brands, including Lululemon, Rhode, and Nordstrom, use ShopMy’s technology. The platform said since its launch in 2020, it has generated more than $352 million in total brand sales, achieving an average 5x return on investment.

ShopMy also offers automation tools that make the creator marketing process more seamless. Lookbooks is an automated gifting feature that reduces time spent on influencer gifting and minimizes product waste, while a feature called Opportunities automates content creation.

According to ShopMy, more than 190,000 gifts have been sent using Lookbooks since 2023, while in the last six months, brands have created 16,000 pieces of creator content resulting in 125 million views with Opportunities.

ShopMy will use the investment to grow its team and expand into new verticals like health and wellness, hospitality, and family, while doubling down on fashion and beauty.

The funding was led by Bessemer Venture Partners and Bain Capital Ventures. Menlo Ventures and previous investors Inspired Capital and AlleyCorp also participated in the round. Individual investors including Eric Chan, chief business and strategy officer at Gap; and creators Campbell and Jett Puckett and Camila Coehlo, also participated.

“By transforming trusted recommendations into measurable performance marketing,
[ShopMy is] pioneering an entirely new approach to commerce,” said Jeremy Levine, partner at Bessemer, in a statement.

Musician Post Malone and comedian Shane Gillis have been caught on someone’s doorbell cam with a case of Bud Light in tow.

At least, that’s the story behind the brand’s sneak peek of its Super Bowl 59 ad. The 15-second teaser video “Knock, Knock… It’s SBLIX,” doesn’t give too much away—beyond the fact the pair are looking for a party.

The campaign from Anomaly will mark Post Malone’s fourth Super Bowl campaign with Bud Light, and Gillis’ first Super Bowl appearance with the NFL’s official beer sponsor.

Malone, who recently released a country album “F-1 Trillion,” will also be part of Bud Light’s Super Bowl takeover, kicking off the weekend in New Orleans with a performance on Feb. 7.

A light-hearted tone

Building on its “Easy Night Out” 2024 Big Game campaign, it seems Bud Light will stick with a light-hearted approach to its Super Bowl ad after a tumultuous few years.

Following a 2023 controversy over a partnership with transgender influencer Dyan Mulvaney, which sparked a fallout on the right and left of the political spectrum, the Anheuser-Busch (AB InBev)-owned brewer has leaned on creative work that speaks to its core audience of young adults (primarily men and sports fans).

Last year, its “Easy to Summer” ad showed people cooling off in the heat with Bud Light, while its campaign to kick off the NFL season featured real football fans. 

After a rocky few quarters, AB InBev reported revenues of $15.57 billion in November, up from $15.04 billion in the same period in 2023. The business credited stabilization in the U.S. market for the shift.

In 2022, AB InBev lost exclusivity in the Super Bowl’s alcohol category following a 34-year run. This year, it will still be the largest Super Bowl advertiser across all beer, alcohol, and consumer packaged goods companies in 2025.

For the latest Super Bowl 59 advertising news—who’s in, who’s out, teasers, full ads and more—check out ADWEEK’s Super Bowl Ad Tracker.

The numbers

18.91 million — Netflix’s number of paid net subscriber additions in Q4.

302 million — The streamer’s total subscribers to end the year, up from 282.72 in Q3.

16% — The company’s reported year-over-year revenue increase.

$43.5 billion to $44.5 billion — The company’s forecast for 2025 revenue.

$7.99 — Netflix’s new ad tier price after a $1 hike.

The watercooler talk

For possibly the last time, Netflix reported major subscriber numbers in Q4. The company added nearly 19 million paid subs (excluding extra member accounts), putting it over 300 million paid accounts and bringing its total sub adds in 2024 to 41 million.

Netflix previously announced that it would stop reporting quarterly subscriber numbers and average revenue per membership in Q1 2025, and the company reiterated that in a letter to investors today, noting that it would “continue to announce paid memberships as we cross key milestones.”

Beyond paid members, the company said 55% of sign-ups in ad-tier-supported countries went to the ads plans. The ads plan is apparently so successful that Netflix is reportedly raising the price by $1 to $7.99. The company’s other price increases include the standard ad-free plan going from $15.49 to $17.99 per month, the premium tier increasing from $22.99 to $24.99 per month, and an extra member account increasing from $7.99 to $8.99 per month.

The key quote

“As we continue to invest in programming and deliver more value for our members, we will occasionally ask our members to pay a little more so that we can re-invest to further improve Netflix. To that end, we are adjusting prices today across most plans in the U.S., Canada, Portugal, and Argentina.” — Netflix’s letter to investors

The future of TV was on display at CES, and data and artificial intelligence were at the center of it.

Media buyers, executives, and leaders in the tech industry flooded the Las Vegas Convention Center at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month, seeing the latest tech and trends affecting the TV ad industry.

To learn about where the industry is going next, ADWEEK spoke to several media buyers, executives, and experts in attendance, learning about the latest trends and industry themes to watch out for in 2025 and beyond.

Here are three of the themes that were prevalent at CES this year that could impact the future of TV:

AI and data continue to blur the lines between legacy publishers and tech

AI was the buzzword of CES, with the tech leading to innovation in everything from frequency capping to audience targeting. However, as AI and data become even bigger cornerstones of company offerings, the lines between media companies and tech companies continue to blur.

Among the highlights, industry insiders pointed to legacy media companies bolstering their tech. For instance, during Disney’s fifth-annual Global Tech & Data Showcase, the company unveiled a slate of new features with AI capabilities, including Select AI Engine, a tool that allows brands to build custom lookalike audiences and deliver sequential messaging—all while expanding reach without impacting frequency caps.

Not to be outdone, NBCUniversal announced a slate of new advertising features and AI capabilities, including the expansion of its Ad Creative Engine, which uses generative AI, machine learning, and statistical models to understand the historical performance of ad creative within specific content, predicting how creative will perform for various KPIs such as brand awareness and message breakthrough.

Meanwhile, free, ad-supported, and tech-focused streamers are continuing to gain share in a fragmented marketplace as they creep closer to acting like legacy publishers. For its part, Tubi said it had 97 million monthly active users and more than 10 billion streaming hours in 2024, with 77% of its viewers not having cable, according to a November MRI Cord Evolution Study.

Streaming services attempt to improve the user experience

Beyond data, media companies are also looking for improved user experiences as a way to mitigate fragmentation, according to experts. For example, one buyer pointed to DirecTV, which announced last year during Advertising Week that it was launching MyFree DirecTV, a dedicated free, ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) platform.

Like other companies, DirecTV’s move to free, ad-supported video looks to break down barriers to entry among the cash-conscious viewing audience.

Experts suggested that rebundling tied to the user experience is a way the industry is looking to improve viewer satisfaction and reduce fragmentation, with the industry moving away from being an ecosystem of disparate apps and walled gardens.

Roku, which announced that it has more than 90 million streaming households, is one example of how companies can coexist, with the platform having a home screen that provides easy navigation and sponsorship opportunities for brands and streamers.

TVs: bigger, faster, stronger

On the product and consumer-facing side, three media experts told ADWEEK they were also interested in the evolution of TVs.

“The biggest TV trend—and not just this year—and this has been going on since after the pandemic, I do see TV screens losing its status of being a stationery, focal point of the living room and becoming more portable,” Richard Yao, associate director, strategy and content, IPG Media Lab, told ADWEEK. “There’s a lot more experiment with the form factor. It almost feels like TV is not only just TV. It’s like a super tablet display for your home.”

Though TVs are going from stationary to portable, two of the experts also noted that the tech has the potential to be the centerpiece of smart home hubs, displaying information passively while showcasing customizable widgets.

Along those lines, Samsung revealed The Frame Pro, which is optimized for displaying artwork. There’s also the possibility of E-ink art displays for use at home, which mimic the appearance of printed ink on paper and can be mounted permanently, requiring minimal maintenance. 

Other futuristic TVs on their way to consumers include weatherproof units, wireless products, and AI offerings, which monitor and manage battery life. There are also products such as JubileeTV, which are designed to simplify the TV experience for seniors, even including features for teleconferencing with doctors.

Streamers had a festive holiday season full of football and blockbusters.

According to Nielsen ratings from its Gauge December 2024 report (which accounts for viewership from Nov. 25 through Dec. 29), TV viewing was up 4% month over month, with streamers gaining a big share of audience time.

Linear still outperformed streaming in terms of individual broadcasts, with Fox’s Thanksgiving game between the Giants vs. Cowboys attracting 38.5 million viewers; however, several streamers reached (or were near) record highs. Along with a 7.6% increase in November, streaming viewership rose another 9% in December, and the category secured a new record with 43.4% of total TV watch time.

Netflix was a big winner, with the fifth and sixth top telecasts of the month thanks to its NFL Christmas Day games, both of which earned over 23 million viewers. The streamer accounted for 8.5% of total TV viewing last month, which tied its platform-best share, which was set in July 2023. With the help of the Christmas Day games, Netflix had a 14% month-over-month boost.

Speaking ahead of Netflix’s earnings on Tuesday, Mike Proulx, Forrester vp, research director, shed light on the streamer’s strong Q4.

“Netflix has a lot to tout coming off a Q4 with a number of key milestones that by no coincidence all involve sports,” Proulx said, adding that the company will likely promote “a lot more live programming events over the course of 2025.”

According to the Gauge, calculations showed the streaming service’s monthly usage would have been up 11% even if contributions from the games were not included. Netflix saw a boost from its action thriller film Carry-On starring Taron Egerton, which generated 5.2 billion viewing minutes from the Dec. 13 through Dec. 29 period and became the third-most streamed title during that time. Squid Game Season 2 also accounted for 4.9 billion viewing minutes in the final week of the period, the highest weekly total for any streaming title last year.

Additionally, nearly all reported streaming platforms exhibited gains. YouTube was up 9%, pushing the platform to a record 11.1% share of TV usage. Meanwhile, Prime Video reached a platform-best 4.0% share of TV since it hosted five NFL Thursday Night Football games, including one on Black Friday during the December interval. The platform also had a boost from blockbuster flick Red One, starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Chris Evans, and original reality series Beast Games, starring popular YouTube creator Jimmy “MrBeast” Donaldson, which had 700 million viewing minutes across its first three episodes.

Showing the strength of streaming beyond live events, Max received an 18% monthly viewing increase in December, the largest across all streaming platforms. Those upticks were driven by its library of shows such as The Big Bang Theory, Friends, and Dune: Prophecy.

Broadcast and cable largely relied on football in December, with each seeing increases in sports viewership of 17% and 29%, respectively, due to the NFL, college bowl games, and the first round of college football playoffs. Cable also received an 18% bump in feature film viewing.

However, both broadcast and cable had to also contend with seasonal-related declines. Broadcast networks withdrew from scripted dramas during the holiday season, which resulted in an 18% dip in that genre, and cable news, after the presidential election cycle, dropped by 27%, according to the report.

Overall, broadcast and cable viewing accounted for 22.4% and 23.8% of December TV watch time, respectively, and 46.2% of TV viewing combined.