While we’re not aware of any awards for making the year’s worst ad campaign, but if they do exist then 2014’s winner would undoubtedly be Sprint’s godawful “Framily” ads that featured a family sired by a talking hamster. FierceWireless reports via Twitter that incoming Sprint CEO Marcelo Claure seemingly agrees that this year’s “Framily” ads were truly horrible by any standards because they did a lousy job of communicating exactly what Sprint was trying to offer.
FROM EARLIER: Sprint brings down the hammer with $60 unlimited plan… but there are some catches
“There wasn’t a compelling value proposition at Sprint,” Claure said of the ads during Super Mobility Week in Las Vegas this week. “We were marketing a hamster talking to people.”
Claure’s repudiation of his company’s “Framily” ads comes at a time when Sprint is finally getting serious about offering more competitive individual and family plans. Last month, for instance, Sprint unveiled a new $60 plan that gives you unlimited talk, text and data but that also will let Sprint throttle your connection speed during peak traffic hours to give priority to users who don’t have unlimited plans. Sprint also unveiled competitive new family plans that effectively double the monthly data allotments of older family plans without raising prices a dime, although those new plans are only available to new customers who come from other carriers and not current Sprint subscribers.
Whether this is enough to turn things around for Sprint remains to be seen, but one thing is clear: We at least won’t have to look at the Framily hamster on our TVs anymore.
