‘Fansville’ turns seven: How creators built football’s quirkiest town and the blueprint for its next phase

They looked a bit out of place, the ad agency execs and their camera crew wearing Dr Pepper gear at the College Football Playoff National Championship more than six years ago. They weren’t pulling for Alabama or Georgia, the participants in that epic title game. Rather, in January 2018, they had an idea for a new advertising campaign.

They needed to flesh it out. They also didn’t know what they were getting into.

“We got great footage of people wearing their lucky pants,” recalled Ryan Lehr, award-winning chief creative officer at Deutsch LA, the ad agency that has the Dr Pepper account. “People were cooking steaks [stamped] with the logo of the other team.”

Travis Swingler, a member of the Deutsch creative team that day, recalled a “generational mysticism” after experiencing the scene. It wasn’t just a championship game. The group had chosen to sample the tailgate at the ultimate game in the Deep South between SEC rivals.

“It was kind of lost on me until we dived into it,”f Swingler said. “We kind of went all in on the fans… It seemed like an untapped treasure trove of strangeness.”

On that day, “Fansville” began its birth cycle. The iconic Dr Pepper ad campaign turns seven Monday with the release of the latest round of satirical episodic ads.

If you’re not familiar, you’re not paying attention. Those ad agency types got it right. They tapped into the game’s passion, fervor and, yes, strangeness. For six seasons, we’ve watched the mythical town whose existence revolves around “State” beating “Tech.”

The characters have burrowed their way into our consciousness, if not our hearts. Brian Bosworth, as the sheriff. The wacky, face-painted fan, veteran character actor Nick Ballard. The Grillmaster, Jay Reeves. Les Miles made a memorable appearance as a store clerk who stole the national championship trophy. They all have subversively let us in on the joke.

And that joke, it turns out, is a reflection of us, the fans.

“It was an American tradition that I didn’t know existed, that was so intense,” Swingler told CBS Sports. “People spending thousands of dollars to show their team love and take part in these games on a regular basis.

“I’ve been around people who followed the Grateful Dead. That was about the closest thing, people who followed a band around. But this was way more intense than that… I don’t think any of us going into it wanted to disrespect it.”

They haven’t. Fansville has become a college football tradition on a level just below the 3:30 p.m. ET window on CBS. Game day wouldn’t be game day without Fansville and vice versa. The ads are appointment viewing without having an appointment.

The fact we don’t know when exactly the spots are going to appear only adds to the suspense. What’s next? Quinn Ewers, for starters. The Texas quarterback is the latest athlete to be featured in the series. He follows DJ Uiagalelei, Bryce Young and Caleb Williams, who have appeared all since 2021 when the NIL era began.

None of them received acting lessons. Maybe that was the point. There was the organic nature of watching Young be adopted by the character CJ’s family (“They’re my family now.”) We found out Williams isn’t superstitious.

“Quinn was so eager, so fun getting to know,” Lehr said. “We kind of met with him in the trailer and gave him the 101 of what was going to happen. The one thing about these high-level athletes is they are no stranger to high-pressure situations.”

Brad Rakes — a senior director for Dr. Pepper in brand marketing — said the company takes a collaborative approach between its team and partners in vetting athletes who should appear in the ads. 

We aim to align with NIL athletes that are culturally relevant and who are fans of Dr Pepper,” Rakes said.

Ewers, who great up in Texas where Dr. Pepper is king, was a smart fit for the 2024 campaign. 

“I don’t look at it as pressure,” Ewers said. “I don’t put my worth in wondering what people are thinking about me. And people who only take one breath at a time.”

Nobody said this was the fourth quarter against Oklahoma in Red River, but let the hyperventilating begin. Ewers actually plays Boz’s deputy in an episode called “Calling for Backup.”

“The fans are going crazy because State won a big game,” Ewers said. “I have to call for backup. [We decide] ‘We don’t need any backup. I’ve got this.’”

The spots were shot over a period of days in Santa Clarita, California, a modest town about 30 miles north of the Rose Bowl, a possible venue for Texas and Ewers in the CFP.

“It’s like him and Bosworth as a comedy team,” Lehr said. “We did challenge Quinn a little bit more. In the past maybe DJU was just sort of playing himself. Bryce was playing himself. We thought it would be a good opportunity to be more of a character.”

Details are scant because the ads will be rolled out over the course of the season. You’ll either get them, or you won’t. Over the span of the campaign, the ads have used genre-matching as a technique. A spot about the coaching carousel vaguely refers to Ray Bradbury’s “Something Wicked This Way Comes.”

One of the transfer portal episodes borrowed from every time travel movie cliché there is. State’s starting quarterback is hanging on to a light pole to keep from being sucked into the portal.

The Grillmaster can’t save him because using both hands would require him to use his “Dr Pepper hand.” The quarterback slips into the vortex, screaming, “That’s OK. I understand.”

“Quarterbacks are replaceable,” rationalizes CJ’s dad (Jason Wiles).

Swingler played high school football but graduated from an art and design college in Los Angeles. Lehr grew up in South Bend, Indiana. In every picture as a youth, he recalls wearing something Fighting Irish related. That was the inspiration for the birth of Ballard’s baby — in full Tech gear.

There was intention behind auditioning supporting actors but were vaguely recognizable.

“They didn’t have to be big,” Swingler said. “It didn’t have to be, ‘I recognize that person from a show.’ The notion of a B-list, C-list, D-list drama series. That was a key strategy in casting.”

Bosworth is the lead character, sort of an Andy Griffith type. Boz has substantial acting experience. Eddie George, as the town doctor, had appeared on Broadway. Then NIL came along, and Dr Pepper could make acting/commercial stars out of football stars.

Every development in the game over the last six years circulated through pitch meetings and came with the question: How would Fansville react to it?

“Fans are fanatical by nature and they always go to 11,” Swingler said. “Fansville is even more than that. Sometimes they take it to 12 or 14.”

For Ewers, this kind of closes a circle. Three years ago, he reclassified out of high school so he could get to Ohio State and begin capitalizing on NIL benefits. Ewers did just that, becoming one of the first big names to break the seal on name, image, and likeness. Never mind that he barely played in 2021 before transferring back home to Texas. 

He is now a leading Heisman Trophy candidate at a school that lets it be known Lamborghinis are available to prospects. Ewers didn’t get one, but it’s safe to assume he has been well compensated at this point.

“I think universities make a lot of money off a lot of sports and people that play the sports,” Ewers said. “We put a lot of time and effort not only in athletics but also school and trying to manage all these things. Trying to bring in all the money we bring in, we do deserve compensation for doing that for these universities.”

Meanwhile, the brainstorming continues.

Lehr was in the car with a client on the way back from a Notre Dame game last year when someone mentioned the “hype train,” a college football staple label for being overrated.

“I said, ‘That’s next year,’” Lehr recalled.

So it will be. Monday’s press release mentions “the media buzz around overhyped teams, reflecting on last season’s excitement over the ‘Colorado Hype Train.’”

Wait, no way. They wouldn’t cast Coach Prime, would they? Stay tuned.

This iteration of ads will also feature 29-year-old design wonder Nigel Xavier, who will create “one-of-a-kind football outfits” according to the release.

A fashion designer. Has Fansville jumped the shark? More likely, it will be more of that reflection of our football psyche — with a smirk.

“I’m very much still digging the Kool-Aid of Fansville,” said Swingler, who now works for Disney. “It just keeps getting better.”