ADdicted: LEGO Gold

Messi. Ronaldo. Mbappé. Vini Jr.

I'm not a "sports guy", but even I can recognize the biggest names playing football today.

If you were a lucky football fan, you might get to see one of these players on a pitch at some point in your life.

If you were really lucky, you might get to see two playing against each other in a game.

But it would be extraordinary to see all four players sitting together around a table.

Leave it to LEGO to make that happen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neH3E2MZyoo

This LEGO advertisement gets a gold star because it does two things exceptionally well.

First, it uses its celebrities in a believable way. Sure, finding these four players together in a room with a LEGO set is an unlikely scenario, but if it were to happen, can we imagine them sitting down to build it, then competing to see who comes out on top (in this case, literally)?

Absolutely.

Because it's what most people would do if they found themselves in a room with a bunch of LEGO. On a football pitch, these four are not like anybody reading this... but in a room full of LEGO? We are the same!

And second, it doesn't forget that the purpose of an advertisement is to sell products. So, despite the celebrity athletes appearing in the ad, it makes LEGO the hero of the story.

The athletes are the celebrities, but it's the LEGO that unites them in their common goal.

(The commercial aspect of the ad isn't in-your-face until the very end, when all five "World Cup" sets are shown, but I'm willing to bet that this was a concession the marketing team willingly made to help justify what was likely an eye-popping spend on this ad.)

There aren't many companies that have the resources to put together a spot like this one.

I'm glad the ones that do continue to do so.