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In January 2026, everyone started posting pictures of how it was 10 years ago. 10 years ago some were teenagers, some lost people they loved, some walked the very first steps towards their dream career, some moved out of the country, etc.
The stories are endless. And so are the memories. That is why we’re dedicating this piece for the sake of nostalgia (with our marketing twist, of course). Let’s reminisce on the golden ads that we witnessed in 2016 and see which of them ruled the year.
Orange Egypt: Zahma ya Shahr
In Ramadan of 2016, Orange Egypt released a fun ad that displayed the chaos you find in how busy Ramadan is as a month. Featuring Akram Hosny and Ahmed Fahmy, the ad shows how both are stuck within the chaos that Ramadan sometimes causes in terms of shopping, buying groceries, getting ready for meal prepping, deciding who will eat at whose place, and more. It is a fun, lighthearted ad that checked all the boxes for that year.
Vodafone: Listen to Music Endlessly
Vodafone took Essam Omar’s back-then-fresh face and one of Hakim’s top trendiest songs from 2014 and turned them both into one of the funniest and most relatable scenes ever. Essam Omar vibing over Halawet Rouh in every mood of his daily life on Vodafone’s package for listening to music is just pure brilliance. Egyptian humor implemented? Check.
Mountain View’s iCity Campaign
Maged El Kedwany and Ahmed Ezz have always been two of the most loved screen duos in Egypt. And Mountain View? They leveraged the Egyptian love for these two and created a funny campaign that took us on a global trip. Comparing iCity with Paris or New York and saying that it’s even better than both through the charisma of both celebrities is just pure genius. And in 2016? We all enjoyed seeing them both dominate the screen while getting informed about the benefits of iCity.
Vodafone Egypt: El Eila el Kebeera
Ramadan is always packed with amazing advertisements that are creative, colorful, feature many celebrities, have a nice and very catchy tune, and radiate that Ramadan vibe. Vodafone Egypt in 2016 ticked all the boxes. It featured a very large group of celebrities and created the perfect ad for Ramadan that encompasses the family vibes and different Ramadan moods. As always, highlighting that they connect people in more than one way.
Juhayna’s Children Campaign: A Controversy
Memorable doesn’t always have to be in a positive way. Although some found the Juhayna campaign for 2016 funny and creative, some found it very unprofessional and not as funny as the creators thought it would be. The campaign features babies in the process of weaning and expressing their suffering. Out of the box? Maybe. Appropriate? Not with some words or implications used in some of the scripts used in various ad copies.
Why This Trend and Why Now?
Memories have their weird way of working. They remind us of a feeling, a moment, a time when certain things happened in certain ways. 2016, like any other year, holds a lot within its layers. And that is why a lot of people are reminiscing over how they were like 10 years ago.
What did they do, and where are they now? Did they achieve dreams or change them? Too many questions that our current present answers. And if we look at it from a marketing perspective, in 2026, we can see how brands evolved, what new strategies they will present us with, and how brands fail, succeed, rise, or fall.
