Hasta La Creative!

“Allison” breaks expectations. She’s the reason Pizza Hut made their new three-cheese stuffed crust pizza.

“Allison” is also a made up persona with which pizza lovers are likely to identify. Not only does she wear funky-librarian glasses, she has a pretty substantial back tattoo of a Pegasus. Hello 20-something hipsters with a beer buzz.

That she also loves hot cheese and bread pie from Pizza Hut goes without saying. No doubt, she will work off the calories at Pilates.

According to an Ad Age report from last month, the Chicago office of mcgarrybowen is the new agency of record for this YUM Brands account.

The post Hipsters “Go for Greatness” at Pizza Hut appeared first on AdPulp.

Chevrolet and Major League Baseball probably made the prudent call to cancel its “Silverado Strong” World Series promotion. With critics claiming it was too similar to the “Boston Strong” mantra adopted by the city after the Boston Marathon bombing, it could have erupted into a social-media firestorm.

But even Hill Holiday Chairman Mike Sheehan, who led the effort to create the One Fund Boston charity that’s raised $72 million for bombing victims, thinks Chevy and MLB went overboard canceling the promotion in which fans were supposed to hold signs spelling out “Silverado Strong” during Game 5 at Busch Stadium in St. Louis.

The use of the term “Strong” is ubiquitous on Madison Avenue and in pop culture, noted Mr. Sheehan. Think the U.S. Army’s “Army Strong” ad campaign, which replaced the late “Army of One” effort. The victims of Hurricane Sandy in the state of New Jersey have adopted “Jersey Strong” as their slogan for resilience and recovery. Don’t forget disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong’s “Livestrong” foundation.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

Deciding early on between art direction and nursing, Carolyn Hadlock chose the X-Acto blade over the hypodermic syringe. Now, as the principal and executive creative director of Young & Laramore, she leads creative work for clients ranging from Schlage locks to Procter & Gamble to Goodwill Industries. But there’s more to Ms. Hadlock than the ad business, as she reveals in this week’s installment of “Six Things.”

1. She detassled corn when she was 14. The foreman was a woman who kept forgetting her name and calling her “blue shirt.” When Ms. Hadlock asked the foreman for her name, it turned out to be Carolyn as well. “She still called me blue shirt after I told her that if she could remember her name, she could remember mine.”

2. She’s a ham sandwich snob. Ms. Hadlock claims she could tell you the best place to get a ham sandwich in any major city. For the non-believers out there, some proof: In Indianapolis, Ms. Hadlock recommends Keystone Deli, where the ham comes warm, thick and stacked high. In Chicago, go to Hannah’s Bretzel on Monroe Street; in Savannah, Ga., it’s Goose Feathers Cafe; and in Richmond, Va., you need to get to Richmond on Broad Cafe.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

It’s been a few months since we’ve heard about the goings-on at Commerce Bank, which parted ways with Kansas City-based agency Bernstein-Rein after 14 years this past summer. Well, the financial institution has finally made a decision and has appointed Olson as its new agency of record. The Commerce win comes just a week after the Minneapolis-based full-service digital agency took over on North American duties for electronics brand Sharp.

Regarding the move to Olson, which follows a national agency search, Commerce EVP/corporate marketing director Eric Steinhouse says, “We talked to a number of outstanding agencies, but Olson’s strategic and multi-channel expertise set it apart. They connected with us, and they connected all the dots.” As AOR, Olson will pretty much handle it all, from strategy and research to advertising, media buying/planning and analytics for Commerce, a 148-year-old brand that boasts 200 banks from Illinois to Colorado. Sources tell us that Olson beat out Richards Group and Rodgers Townsend for the Commerce account.

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There were many causes of death for the Early Bird, among them Internet services that made the effort seem like an anachronism.

Just how complex has online advertising become? Very — especially among the biggest spenders.

The top advertisers’ online ad campaigns are nearly six times as complex as the average, according to data provided to Ad Age by DG MediaMind. The company reviewed 350 billion global display, video and mobile impressions served on its platform between 2010 and 2013 as part of its new “Complexity” study and found that the use of tags and sophisiticated targeting and analytics is booming, especially among the top-10% of advertisers.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

U.S. antitrust authorities from the Federal Trade Commission have cleared the Omnicom Group and Publicis Groupe merger.

“The expiration of the HSR review period in the U.S. and the approvals received in other jurisdictions satisfy some of the conditions necessary for the transaction to close,” Publicis Groupe said in a statement. HSR refers to the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976.

The companies also received regulatory approval in Canada, India, Turkey, South Africa and South Korea.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

Advertising Agency: Jam, London, United Kingdom
Executive Creative Director: Wayne Deakin
Creative Director: Chris De Abreu
Head of Film: Drew Wolf
Lead Agency Producer: Veronica Saez
Creatives: Luke Norton, Drew Wolf
Community Manager: Sophie Mindell
Account Director: Juyong Kim
Head of Planning: Iain Matthews
Planner: Helen Spencer
Project Manager: Adam Green
Production Company: Annex Films
Producers: Annex Films
Director: John X Carey
Editor: Annex Films

After all of the recent Derrick Rose Basketball is Everything TV play, let’s not forget that Adidas’ slim basketball holdings do include the mercurial superstar-child, Dwight Howard. TBWA\Singapore and Dwight teamed for a new international spot way east of America, where 180LA handles domestic duty. The Phillipines is thoroughly obsessed with basketball, and Howard’s Houston Rockets recently traveled to Manila for some preseason play and NBA global brand-building. Adidas wisely used the setting for some brand-building of their own. And as a result, here is the one-and-a-half minute intro video for Signature Shots.

Instead of receiving handwritten autographs from Dwight, fans were able to play him one-on-one as a machine captured their movement on the court and translated that into a unique signature that could be printed onto merchandise. I’m all for the riff on standard sit-and-sign celebrity sessions, even if some of the signatures look like seismograph scribbles, but this spot just feels underwhelming. The clip starts off with some promising B-roll footage of Manila and it’s young hoopsters.

However, all of the vibrant colors and sounds of the city are soon replaced by action shots of machines printing the movement signatures and Dwight playing one-on-one. Rather than wash out all of the sensory details with some techno track, Adidas and TBWA would’ve been wiser to let Manila create its own soundtrack. Watching a printer spit out signed memorabilia is just time wasted. There was a missed opportunity here to create a commercial worthy of Manila’s love for basketball. There will be more opportunities in the future, but Adidas will have to wait. Credits after the jump.

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