5 of the Biggest AI Ad Snafus So Far (2024)

Brands promoting ads featuring artificial intelligence, and tech capabilities at large, are not reading the room.

Major brands such as Levi’s and Toys R Us have eagerly experimented with AI in their marketing efforts. Tech giants like Google and Apple have funneled billions of dollars into their AI technology.

Despite these efforts, their attempts to sell AI to people have missed the mark.

From tone-deaf messaging to unintentional bias, several high-profile AI ad snafus were lambasted and sparked conversations about the power of AI in people’s lives.

“Viewers have been hit with a tsunami of AI ads this summer, and during the (2024 Summer Olympic Games) in particular,” said Gartner vice president, analyst Nicole Greene. “Many of the ads that are receiving backlash are showcasing a future that many people fear—one where we have lives increasingly connected to screens, with curated content served on-demand and lacking uniquely human and authentic connection.”

ADWEEK compiled the most controversial AI-adjacent ads, asking analysts to evaluate emotional resonance and predict brand growth based on ad creativity.

No gold medal for Google’s ‘Dear Sydney’ Olympics ad

The ad: Google’s 60-second ad, “Dear Sydney,” begins with a father wanting to help his daughter write a letter to her Olympic idol, American hurdler Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone. However, the ad takes an awkward turn when instead of helping his daughter write the letter, he prompts Gemini to do it for them.

The controversy: Criticism quickly followed the ad after it began airing during NBCUniversal’s Olympics broadcast, with many viewers lambasting it for being tone-deaf on AI overshadowing the human effort to write a heartfelt fan letter, while others found the ad to be “less inspiring.”

“This ad makes me want to throw a sledgehammer into the television every time I see it,” wrote Washington Post columnist Alexandra Petri. Google pulled its ad.

Analysis: Despite the negative backlash, System1, which uses a star rating to predict brand growth based on an ad’s creative quality, gave Google’s spot a strong score of 4.4 out of 5.9.

It found that Sydney’s human story does the heavy emotional lifting, prioritizing people over the product, and that it champions diversity and inclusion. However, System1’s analysis also found that a negative emotional response from the audience is generated when Gemini is introduced in the ad.

“AI is a challenging topic to address, consistently evoking fear and contempt among audiences. Ads discussing AI generate twice the negative emotion compared to other ads,” said Jon Evans, chief customer officer of System1.“Writing letters is an intensely personal and human activity, and replacing it with AI diminishes the personal connection. AI should serve as an assistant, not a substitute, enhancing human creativity rather than overshadowing it.”

Apple really didn’t ‘Crush!’ it

The ad: Apple’s recent iPad Pro commercial, “Crush!,” depicted a hydraulic press slowly destroying various creative tools, such as musical instruments, paint cans, and sculptures. Apple’s intent was clear—everything you can do with these items, you can also do with the iPad Pro.

The controversy: The ad sparked discontent within the creative community. Many viewers found the ad unsettling and interpreted it as a reinforcement of the existing fear among creatives of an Orwellian future where AI overtakes human creativity.

“The destruction of the human experience. Courtesy of Silicon Valley,” actor Hugh Grant said on X. Apple apologized shortly after the ad was released, stating that the company “missed the mark,” and it scrapped plans to run the commercial on TV.

Analysis: System1 gave this ad spot a low 1.9 score.

“Audiences don’t necessarily hate the ad, they’re just confused,” said Evans. “When you look at the audience’s emotional breakdown, it’s mostly neutrality, not negativity, driving the low star rating. It’s a statement ad that caught attention, but many consumers just don’t get the point of it, so the intentions are ultimately lost.”

Toys R Us’ all-AI brand film sparks outcry

The ad: Not a conventional ad, but the toy retailer made a 60-second brand film almost entirely created with generative AI, featuring its late founder, Charles Lazarus, as a child dreaming of a toy store and its mascot, Geoffrey the Giraffe.

Toys R Us Studio and Native Foreign, the retailer’s entertainment arm, tapped into OpenAI’s Sora—a text-to-video AI tool yet to be widely released to the public—to make this film.

The controversy: The film sparked an outcry on social media among the creator community for allegedly using an AI tool trained on plagiarized work of artists and unlicensed IP. One creator called it a work of “abomination,” while others criticized the quality of the output, stating that Lazarus appears to look different across several frames.

Analysis: Kantar analyzed this brand film using its LINK AI, a creative development tool trained on thousands of ads assessed by real people. The spot by the toy company scored reasonably well across most metrics.

The creative was rated as impactful, placing in the 74th percentile of all ads in the database. It was also deemed likely to aid long-term brand building, with a “Power Score” in the 74th percentile. However, its “Persuasion” score was average, at the 55th percentile, indicating that it’s not likely to encourage people to purchase in the short term.

“Ultimately, any ads or content produced have to be effective and not get caught up in the battle for efficiency that AI can bring,” said Jane Ostler, executive vp, global thought leader at Kantar. “Effectiveness is about your ad achieving its objectives and means your ad needs to bring out the meaningful difference of your brand, be persuasive, and create an emotional connection.”

Levi’s AI-generated BIPOC models raise concerns

The ad: Although not an ad, Levi’s announced its partnership last year with Lalaland.ai, an Amsterdam-based company that uses AI to create realistic avatars for fashion and retailer brands.

The controversy: The announcement triggered a social media uproar, leaving people wondering why the brand wouldn’t just hire more diverse models and calling the decision “lazy” and “problematic.” Others warned that AI-generated models would deprive the BIPOC (Black, indigenous, and other people of color) community of job opportunities.

Analysis: “While Levi’s has been at pains to stress that it is still photographing with real models, this is an example of AI use for efficiency that could easily backfire,” said Ostler. “Using AI-generated models could be seen as a lazy and deceptive way to achieve diversity.”

More so, gen AI imagery could propagate harmful, stereotypical associations involving race, gender, and ethnicity, said Greene.

“In addition, this may affect the employment of diverse models who have worked hard to gain a place in the industry,” Greene added. “The ability to use gen AI to create realistic, diverse models for advertising is at the intersection of two key conversations happening right now—concerns around job loss and the importance of diversity and inclusion in advertising.”

Baggu’s AI-generated bag print is ‘unforgivable‘

The ad: San Francisco-based sustainable brand Baggu, known for its popular reusable shopping bags, announced a collaboration with New York’s Collina Strada. While Baggu’s special-edition drops typically sell out within minutes, the highly anticipated Collina Strada-Baggu collection faced backlash for featuring AI-generated prints on the bags.

The controversy: After the collaboration was announced, a Reddit user analyzed photos from the collection, which included horse-shaped purses with dream-like prints, using a program that detects AI-generated images. The results indicated an 86.4% likelihood that one of the designs was created using AI. Baggu then confirmed on its website that two prints—Blue Thorns and Boxer Plaid—were “AI-conceptualized” and created using gen AI tool Midjourney.

The outcome? Shoppers were vexed over the lack of transparency on using AI, expressing their disappointment on Baggu’s Instagram page.

“Using AI is unforgivable. Horrible for artists and even more importantly the environment. Hurts my heart but I will not be buying from Baggu anymore,” one user commented.

Analysis: In 2024, a Kantar survey revealed that 62% of 38,000 people aged 18 and above across 29 countries have never tried using gen AI.

“The key issue here is one of transparency, and whether brands should disclose upfront that they are using AI as part of the creative or design process,” said Ostler.