Steve Jobs Bumps Justin Bieber for Super Bowl Inspiration at Best Buy

[Michael Essany]

Consumer electronics retail giant Best Buy is paying a subtle tribute to Steve Jobs this Super Bowl weekend by changing up its ad strategy to reflect the genius of the late Apple chief.

According to a report Wednesday from Bloomberg, Best Buy's Super Bowl commercial won't feature the traditional parade of celebrities. Instead, the passing of Steve Jobs has prompted the retail giant to re-evaluate who today's biggest "stars" truly are.

This year, don't look for Ozzy Osbourne or Justin Bieber, who starred in Best Buy's 2011 ad, to make a splash on Super Bowl Sunday in partnership with Best Buy. This time around, Best Buy is focusing on "innovators who could personify Best Buy’s selling premise: that no one knows more about gadgets and how they work together than the chain’s blue-shirt sales force."

Until Steve Jobs died, Best Buy Co. was plotting a familiar course for its Super Bowl ad: hiring a celebrity spokesman. Then all the tributes poured in after the Apple Inc. founder’s Oct. 5 death, and Best Buy’s U.S. marketing chief, Drew Panayiotou, realized Silicon Valley inventors are today’s stars.

So what will the ad from Best Buy look like on Sunday? According to today's report, it will spotlight inventors Philippe Kahn (camera phone pioneer), and Kevin Systrom (developer of Instagram). “They may not be at the same level as Steve Jobs, but they created some amazing stuff,” says Panayiotou.

By the way, this is the first, last, and only time I will ever reference Justin Bieber on MMi

Source: Bloomberg

[thazsar]

By the way, this is the first, last, and only time I will ever reference Justin Bieber on MMi

LOL!!! Thank You!

[thetoothfairy]

Hey! I like Justin Bieber! He has really worked hard and did well!

[thazsar]

Hey! I like Justin Bieber! He has really worked hard and did well!

Maybe MMI will buy you his poster for your birthday!!! ;-)

[fbiryujin]

Hey! I like Justin Bieber! He has really worked hard and did well!

I don't care for his music, but I don't hate him. So much effort is spent on hating Justin Bieber. It's so stupid. As far as I can tell he's the only teen star that practices what he preaches. Better to spend that hate on things that matter.

/2¢

PS: On topic, I think Best Buy should do this each year. Innovators are more important to society than some rich celebrity who contributes nothing beyond temporary amusement via there medium of entertainment. I get much more use out of Instagram, and the iPhone than I do my Ozzy, or Beach Boys albums.

[Alluziion]

I'm officially a fan of Best Buy and I couldn't agree more

[hollow704]

I would like to point out that we can thank Steve Jobs for overpriced computers, a superior mp3 player, and stylish smartphones but we can thank Dennis Ritchie for C programming which is used in almost every electronic with some form of computing code on it. Without him there would be no Unix, Linux, Windows, OSX, smartphones, today's video gaming systems, etc. Jobs was a hipster and Dennis was the root of today's technology. they both died the same month but no one seems to be celebrating the life of Mr Ritchie.

[Freedom7]

Maybe MMI will buy you his poster for your birthday!!! ;-)

+1

[unixman84]

I would like to point out that we can thank Steve Jobs for overpriced computers, a superior mp3 player, and stylish smartphones but we can thank Dennis Ritchie for C programming which is used in almost every electronic with some form of computing code on it. Without him there would be no Unix, Linux, Windows, OSX, smartphones, today's video gaming systems, etc. Jobs was a hipster and Dennis was the root of today's technology. they both died the same month but no one seems to be celebrating the life of Mr Ritchie.

If i am not mistaken he received a presidential medal that signified with work in tech. thats about as good as it gets in america as far as recognition goes... i would however agree with you that comercial gets in the way and tends to over-inflate certain people. Personally its my opinion that jobs has such a persona because he reached out and made the effort to bring the work of others into the home of the many. It's not so much what he invented but rather how he innovated it.

[brandyn baker]

Great article!

[Paco]

But but but no justin bieber means no little girls wanting to buy at best buy now

[Galrash]

I would like to point out that we can thank Steve Jobs for overpriced computers, a superior mp3 player, and stylish smartphones but we can thank Dennis Ritchie for C programming which is used in almost every electronic with some form of computing code on it. Without him there would be no Unix, Linux, Windows, OSX, smartphones, today's video gaming systems, etc. Jobs was a hipster and Dennis was the root of today's technology. they both died the same month but no one seems to be celebrating the life of Mr Ritchie.

I would like to point out that we all are aware of this, and most of us are tired of having it being brought up over, and over, and over, and over, again and again.