Super Bowl commercials 2013: NBC’s ‘The Office’ inspires Dunder-Mifflin paper ad

Since the following Super Bowl commercial is only going to air around the Scranton, Pennsylvania market on Sunday, we’re going to get to reviewing this spot a little bit early (largely because we will likely spend most of our time during the big game drowning).

The ad – Dunder-Mifflin paper (via Quill.com, which is a co-production between themselves and NBC), “Paper War”

The premise – It’s pretty simple: you have some people at an office fighting each other with paper while acting like total lunatics. This was winner of a contest looking for the best spot for the company to air during the big game.

What works – The show that houses Dunder-Mifflin in “The Office” is often about a workplace that does crazy things, so finding ways to represent that sort of behavior in just 30 seconds, and without using the characters from the show, was not easy. Thankfully, they pulled it off. It was clear from the get-go that this was an ad highlighting paper, and even one with the familiar brand.

What didn’t work – The music. If NBC had just allowed for the familiar “Office” theme on here, just think of how much more attention-grabbing this could have been. The music just felt too cheesy (even for a war), and it was especially unusual for a paper company on a show that rarely ever uses music at all unless it is a character playing an intrument.

The verdict – Overall, a pretty good ad even for just one market. The most important thing is that it makes it clear that Dunder-Mifflin paper does exist in the real world, and it tells you where to get it after you are paying attention.

What do you think of the ad? If you want to take a look at all of the other commercials for the game, be sure to visit the link here.

Photo: CBS / NFL