The shots Guide to...Absolut's Print Ads (Part 1)

Let's play a little advertising-themed Family Fortunes/Feud: name the most iconic alcohol ads of all time. Our survey said...

While the lower reaches of the top 5 are filled with campaigns such as Refreshes the Parts the Other Brands Cannot Reach or Probably the Best Beer in the World, the top spot has to be bottle-shaped. Absolut bottle-shaped.

With the brand's new agency BBH having just created their first print ad featuring an Absolut bottle for Pride in London [right], what better time to look at the best of the 1500+ iterations of what is technically known as Absolut Perfection campaign, but which we all know all the Absolut bottle-shaped ads. That, plus the 10-year campaign that followed it and what to expect from the new relationship with BBH, who released their first video for Absolut in early July.

The First Print Ad

An Absolut bottle ad would be nothing without the bottle itself. Created by a team headed by Swedish adman Gunnar Broman, he based the soon-to-be famous shape of the bottle on an antique Swedish pharmacy bottle. (Interestingly, the brand already had deep ties with advertising history at that point, with the Absolut font 'borrowed' from a Cadillac Seville ad.)

When it came to creating the first print ad for the brand, TBWA pitched an idea that made the most of this distinctive shape, as well as the concept of purity indicated by the clear liquid inside and labels on the bottle. The pitch, led by Bill Tragos, would make advertising history; 'Absolut [Something]'.

The first of those somethings would come in 1980 with the ad that gave the campaign its name, Absolut Perfection [above], with the bottle framed by a halo.

The first five years or so followed the aesthetic of that first ad, with ads starkly lit, the actual bottle itself being featured, and the combination of verbal and physical puns. However, some of the future of the campaign can be seen in ads like Absolut Bastille [below], which was among the first in the series to celebrate a special calendar date, preceding the hundreds of ads that would be created for Valentine's Day, Halloween and other events, making the Absolut ads arguably a precursor to the Google Doodles...

A War-hol New Campaign

Although these early ads are rightly celebrated as minimalist design classics, Absolut ads as we know them would have been very different had Michel Roux, CEO of Absolut's importer Carillon, not met artist Andy Warhol at a dinner. In the book Absolut Book: The Absolut Vodka Advertising Story, the dinner is described:

Over dinner one night, Warhol tells Michel that he’s enthralled by the artfulness of the Absolut bottle. [...]. Warhol proposes painting his own interpretation of the Absolut Vodka bottle [...]

Despite uncertainty at TBWA, Absolut Warhol went ahead (because in-house creatives aren't always wrong), and collaboration with figures from culture was made part of the Absolut brand. Since then, musicians, artists, fashion designers and more have all produced their spins on one of the brands ads, with everyone from Keith Haring [left] to Stella McCartney [centre] to Kurt Vonnegut [right] incorporating an Absolut bottle shape into their aesthetic vision.