Post 5: Research Into Existing TV Commercials For Take-Away Food Delivery Services

I researched this because I wanted to find out how they're structured and the typical conventions of food delivery adverts. I did this by going onto YouTube and watching lots of adverts and finding the similarities between them and then looking analysing individual ones that influenced me a lot. I also used a table to tick off all the things that several adverts featured, for example, locations/settings and conventional techniques.

Research table

I learnt the common conventions of food delivery adverts are featuring the logo, the brand name, the slogan, a VO, and the use of the app or the website. In addition, using a home setting and a delivery man are seen in most food adverts too. To make adverts memorable, adverts feature humour and emotive appeal and occasionally genre hybridity and intertextuality.

Hungryhouse Space analysis 

Deliveroo Eat More Amazing analysis

UberEats Tonight I''l be Eating analysis 

UberEats Back to the 90's analysis

The most influential advert:

JustEat Magic is Real analysis

There are 3 main locations: the home, the restaurant and the street. Each location is signified through the mise-en-scene: the sofas and plant on the window sill in the home, the pots and pans, and utensils in the kitchen, and the vehicles and shop fronts on the street. The logo is seen within the first 3 seconds of the advert, which straight away anchors the fact its a food delivery service advert. This is seen again at the end of the advert, along with the slogan. Representation plays a big part throughout this advert, seen by the range of actors and types of restaurants, with the majority of it seen from 00:32-00:40. The use of different restaurants is a perfect opportunity to cast actors of different racial backgrounds, and also creates comedies they each come out of their shop fronts with the food that JustEat provides to its customers. The use of editing - where the motorbike is flying in the air - suggests that the delivery service is quick. In addition, the delivery man hands over the food smiling, showing that the delivery service is also friendly. The VO is constant throughout the advert and suggests that the food is magic by using its slogan "Summon up your favourite takeaway tonight". The use of the words 'summon up' anchors the title of the advert: "Magic is Real". The LS at the beginning of the advert establishes the setting and is cyclical, as it finishes the advert too. The contrast between the mood at the beginning compared to the end, show how ordering from JustEat makes you happy and excited rather than bored and dull. The advert is memorable as it uses humour seen through the different actors coming out of their restaurants and showing the foods they cook in their restaurants. For example, a bulky Turkish man comes out holding kebabs, singing in a deep voice: "[magic is] shish kebab". The advert follows the ASA guidelines as it doesn't feature any distressing images or anything inappropriate/harmful to the target audience.

This research was beneficial to my project as it influenced me to include as many conventions of a food delivery advert as I could - this will allow me to create strong brand values. I've learnt that the use of representation is essential in adverts to appeal to a wide range of audiences. I plan to cast a range of actors of different ethnicities. Lastly, I've learnt that most adverts feature a CU of the app at the beginning of the advert which I intend to use in my advert.

Research Sources:

Playlist with chosen food delivery adverts