"The 5 Best Food Ads Of All Time"

Over the past few years we’ve witnessed the very foundations of food advertising change after the introduction of new rules banning ads for foods that are high in fat, sugar and salt.

However, there is still room for unconventional creativity in food advertising and these five gems display just that. Here are 5 of the Best food adverts, as picked by UTalkMarketing.

Hovis

This epic 122-second advert charting the recent history of Britain won commercial of the year at this year’s British Television Advertising Awards

Pot Noodle

This classic ad actually landed the brand in some pretty hot water with the mining community...

McCain

Featuring a new takes on a popular tune from a very popular musical – can you guess which?

Walkers

We all love a celerity that can laugh at themselves, and Victoria “Posh” Beckham pulls it off fabulously in this ad for Walker’s Special Crisps

Cadbury

One of the best ads, and most successful, ever made

Big firms spend billions of pounds a year on food advertising, but a new study suggests those advertisers are missing out if their ads only mention taste and ignore our other senses.

Adverts such as Marks & Spencer's 'Not Just' campaign are the most successful because they appeal to taste as well as sight.

University of Michigan authors Ryan S. Elder and Aradhna Krishna claim tapping into our other senses can actually increase consumers' taste perceptions.

"Because taste is generated from multiple senses - smell, texture, sight, and sound - ads mentioning these senses will have a significant impact on taste over ads mentioning taste alone," said Mr Elder.

In their experiments, participants were randomly assigned to view one of two ads. One ad was designed to appeal to multiple senses - for example, a tagline for a chewing gum read "stimulate your senses" - while the other ad mentioned taste alone, "long-lasting flavour".

After sampling the gum, the participants listed thoughts they had regarding the item and then rated the overall taste.

Mr Elder added: "The multiple-sense ad led to more positive sensory thoughts, which then led to higher taste perception than the single-sense ad. The differences in thoughts were shown to drive the differences in taste."

The results were repeated with potato chips and popcorn.

The authors believe their research can help advertisers reword ad copy to lead to significant differences in taste.

Me elder added: "These results are of great value not only to food advertisers, but also to restaurants, as the descriptions contained within menus can actually alter the taste experience.

"Further, companies can implement the findings into product packaging information to alter the taste of products consumed in the home.

"In an increasingly competitive marketplace, ensuring positive consumption experiences is critical to success."

Their research has been published in the latest edition of the Journal of Consumer Research.