10 Mother’s Day campaigns to inspire marketers

Mother’s Day marketing can be both easy and difficult for brand managers.

On one hand, the holiday has so many well-established traditions—flowers, brunches, family celebrations, etc.—that pulling together an acceptable, innocuous campaign is relatively simple. On the other hand, the flood of similar messaging makes it difficult to stand out from the crowd.

To make an impact, a campaign either must deliver perfection with one of the standard approaches or add an original twist.

What do these sorts of exceptional takes on Mother’s Day look like? Here are 10 campaigns from previous years that every marketer can draw inspiration from:

1. Budweiser

This piece from Budweiser stands out as the perfect execution of a traditional Mother’s Day ad. It starts with a grown man (NBA All-Star Kevin Durant) paying tribute to his mother in his MVP acceptance speech and then incorporates clips of other stars with their moms. The ad is funny (Durant’s mom provides a great voice-over of motherly advice layered on top of basketball plays), moving (there’s rousing music and tears aplenty), and overall is pitch perfect.