IT WAS an ad campaign stuffed with legends: Manny Pacquiao, Sonny Jaworski… and Mommy Dionisia.
Released in 2010, this Ginebra ad has the two legends acknowledging each other’s greatness, clinking glasses of Ginebra gin. “Ang bida sa hardcourt!” said Pacquiao. “Ang bida sa ring!” returned Jaworski.
They then go around toasting the other bida in their barkada. (Fifteen-second versions of this ad cut this part out entirely.)
Mommy D shows up after the jump, waltzing in with a tray of pulutan. “Ang bida sa…?” began Jaworski. “Ballroom!” went Pacquiao’s punchline.
Press materials at the time trumpeted the ad as a “historic campaign.”
“We have a dream cast in these three personalities. I know sports fans would be thrilled to see both of their idols in one commercial,” said Nelson S. Elises, Ginebra’s VP for marketing, in a statement. “It would also be interesting to see Mommy Dionisia mixing up her brand of humor in the dynamics of this dream encounter.”
The ad was a continuation of the liquor brand’s “Bida” campaign, begun in 2009 with Pacquiao and his mother Dionisia. In the successful series of TV commercials, Pacquiao played a “mommy’s boy” version of himself, with Mommy D usually popping up at the last moment to chide him and give a little comic relief.
It was a relatable, comedic inversion of his take-no-prisoners in-ring persona — one which would have endeared him even more to his fans.
Ginebra San Miguel Inc. finished 2010 with earnings of P914 million and 39.4 million cases sold — a liquor sales record for the company that remains unbeaten. (2019 came close, though, with 35.9 million cases.)
2010 was also a banner year for Pacquiao, as the legendary icon pummeled Joshua Clottey and Antonio Margarito for two welterweight titles. He was also elected to Congress in that year, serving as representative of his home province of Sarangani.
Jaworski himself had gotten into politics a decade earlier, serving as senator from 1998 to 2004.
The PBA great has largely retired from the public eye since.
But Jaworski’s toast in the ad was not just for show — he’s proven himself a stalwart fan of the boxing champ over the years.
In March 2015, he even visited Pacquaio to wish him luck as the boxer trained in the Wild Card Gym, a few months ahead of the much-hyped bout against Floyd Mayweather. Jaworski, however, was a few weeks too early to catch Mommy D, who arrived in Los Angeles in April.
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