Here's a pretty clever new chapter in Samsung's long-running mockery of Apple line-waiters. For the launch of the Galaxy S4, New Zealand agency Colenso BBDO created a "Smart Phone Line"—a digital queue that fans could join and then move up in line by posting in social media about the phone. A large screen in Auckland actually showed the avatars waiting in line, sharing tweets in real time and skipping ahead. (The fan who worked his or her way to the front of the line by launch got a free S4.) As a subtle jab to Apple fanboys notoriously willing to endure anything for a new iPhone, Samsung's virtual line-waiters curled up in sleeping bags at night and put up umbrellas when it rained. Watch the case study below to see how it worked and hear the results. Via Ads of the World.
Spend a broiling hot summer on the streets of South Central L.A., a time grimly known to locals as "the killing season," to document some former gang bangers who now try to make peace? That's the idea behind LTO: License to Operate, a documentary from Culver City, Calif.-based ad and marketing agency Omelet and production partner Foundation Content. The project, now in Kickstarter mode to raise money for postproduction and music, started when Omelet, Foundation and director James Lipetzky shot a promotional video for nonprofit group A Better LA. Deciding there was a larger story to tell about former gang leaders working to stop violence and rebuild communities, Omelet and private investors ponied up money to get a full-length film off the ground. Omelet, an indie shop whose clients include blue-chippers like AT&T, Microsoft and Sony, wanted to shed light on inner-city gang crime and the dent that can be made when former gang members turn into peace ambassadors. They plan to finish the movie by October, with distribution still to be determined and the $50,000 Kickstarter goal still to be reached.
CREDITS Omelet Producers and Creative Leads: President, Chief Content Officer: Steven Amato EVP Content and Development: Mike Wallen Chairman, CEO, Executive Producer: Don Kurz
Foundation Content Credits Executive Producer: Samantha Hart Director: James Lipetzky Associate Producers: Stacy Paris, Matthew Goodhue
We've written about Google's upcoming Android KitKat operating system. But check out the KitKat website, itself upgraded to tie into the tech theme—it's a scrolling compendium of factoids proving KitKat to be the most high-tech candy bar around. So, while Google and Apple are being more candy-like, KitKat wants to be more Google- and Apple-like. Also, if you missed it, check out KitKat's great "Future of Confectionary" video below, posted earlier this month. Via Adverblog.
OK, Alan Varner, you probably think it's real cute that you broke through the "fourth wall" in this Little Caesars radio ad from Barton F. Graf 9000, inviting listeners who visit the restaurant to "tell 'em Alan Varner sent you. They won't know who that is, but as a voice actor, I'm always trying to get my name out there."
Oh, I imagine you fancy yourself "clever" and "innovative" for lines like, "Check me out at AlanDoesVoices.com. That's A-L-A-N-does-voices.com. But first, get the new Deep! Deep! Dish Pizza. It's hot and ready every day from 4 to 8 p.m. for just eight bucks." This isn't about you, Varner! This is about selling pizza … pizza so deep that the word "deep" gets repeated with exclamation points.
Do I insinuate myself into my AdFreak posts, Varner? I'd never sully this blog's reputation with shameless self-promotion, because I'm not even completely sure what the word "sully" means. I'm providing this link to my work and giving out my Twitter handle, @davegian, as a service to our readers, nothing more.
The idea? Play off Canada's bilingualism by jumbling English and French words on bottle caps of Vitaminwater. The result? The phrase "You Retard" appeared on the lid of a young woman's drink. Even worse (if that's possible), the girl has a half-sister with cerebral palsy.
The snafu came to light this week after Edmonton photographer Blake Loates found the message on her Vitaminwater lid while eating at a restaurant. She sent a photo to her father, Doug Loates, who fired off a lengthy (and tremendously poignant) letter to Coca-Cola demanding an explanation. He described how "the R-word is considered a swear word in our family," primarily because it's a slur that some might use against his 11-year-old daughter, Fiona, whose cerebral palsy has caused cognitive delays and requires that she use a feeding tube.
"What would YOU do if you opened up your bottle of Vitamin Water and on the bottom of the lid it read, 'YOU RETARD?' " he wrote to Coke's board of directors. "I bet you'd be pissed if you had a Fiona in your life!"
Coca-Cola Canada spokeswoman Shannon Denny tells the Metro newspaper that the words used in the promotion were reviewed only from the perspective of French speakers, for whom "retard" means "late." "We did not mean to offend at all. We are certainly very apologetic for this oversight," she says. The remaining lids were reportedly destroyed, and as of Thursday, Coke was drafting a formal apology to the Loates family.
Read Doug Loates's full letter letter to Coke below.
Are you a fan of jorts? No matter. You will be wearing them daily after you move to Cleveland and start working at Brokaw.
Two weeks ago, the 54-person agency rolled out geo-targeted banner ads on Mediabistro, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter encouraging ad people in the larger markets to come and be a big fish in little old Cleveland. Among the perks promised in the ads: that your salary will get you a mansion, and that you'll look "slightly more attractive" than you looked in that bigger town with all those beautiful people. The ads link to brokaw.com/recruitment, where you can actually try to make this Cleveland dream happen.
Brokaw says it's gotten more than 200 résumés from creative, strategic, media, and digital people at agencies like Mullen, Crispin Porter + Boguksy, Draftfab, Young & Rubicam, Taxi, Leo Burnett and Ogilvy & Mather. This is "proof the best culture can attract the best talent," the agency tells us. "Even to a city that still thinks 'jorts' are cool."
You know you have an advertising hit when the parodies start rolling in. Here is Funny or Die's take on the grand new Chipotle "Scarecrow" ad. The parody is just a joke, but it's not the first time the video has been labeled dishonest.
Most of the brand talk around 9/11 this year was about marketers doing it wrong. But DDB New York and the New York City Ballet quietly did it right with a wonderful tribute called "New Beginnings," intended as a testament to the resilience of the human spirit and a tribute to the future of the city.
The video shows NYCB principal dancers Maria Kowroski and Ask la Cour performing on the 57th-floor terrace of Four World Trade Center in lower Manhattan. The backdrop, of course, is One World Trade Center. The dancers perform an excerpt from choreographer Christopher Wheeldon's poignant "After the Rain" pas de deux—signifying new beginnings in New York City.
The film, directed by Davi Russo and produced by Radical Media, was posted at sunrise (6:34 a.m. EST) on Sept. 12 to NYCB's social channels, with the hashtag #NewBeginnings. "Our hope is that 9/12 can now be rebranded as a day of optimism and new beginnings," says Matt Eastwood, chief creative officer of DDB N.Y.
Check out the film, and full credits, below.
CREDITS Client: New York City Ballet Project: "New Beginnings"
Agency: DDB, New York Chief Creative Officer: Matt Eastwood Executive Creative Directors: Menno Kluin, Andrew McKechnie Art Director: Joao Unzer Copywriter: Rodrigo de Castro Management Supervisor: Lauren Neuman Account Executive: Cindy Nguyen Head of Production: Ed Zazzera Executive Producer: Teri Altman Producers: Nina Horowitz, Zamile Vilakazi Teaser Editor: Alec Helm Head of Design: Juan Carlos Pagan Designers: Brian Gartside, Aaron Stephenson Illustrator: Steven Wilson
New York City Ballet Ballet Master in Chief: Peter Martins Executive Director: Katherine Brown Choreographer (After the Rain): Christopher Wheeldon Principal Dancers: Maria Kowroski, Ask la Cour Managing Director, Communications and Special Projects: Robert Daniels Senior Director, Marketing and Media: Karen Girty Director, Media Projects: Ellen Bar
Production Company: Radical Media Director: Davi Russo Editor: Tim Zeigler Executive Producers: Gregg Carlesimo, Maya Brewster Producer: Logan Luchsinger
Adobe just passed the 1 million subscriber mark for its Adobe Creative Cloud and is celebrating with this eye-catching spot from Goodby, Silverstein & Partners—a salute to "the new creatives" in art and advertising.
"Creatives today do a little bit of everything, from illustration to filmmaking to Web design," says GSP associate creative director Will Elliott. "We wanted the spot to celebrate how all these different disciplines are coming together."
The soundtrack is "Default" by Django Django. Full credits below.
CREDITS Client: Adobe Spot: "I Am the New Creative" Campaign: "The New Creatives" Agency: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
Creative Co-Chairman, Creative Director: Rich Silverstein Associate Creative Director: Will Elliott Senior Art Director: Patrick Knowlton Art Director: Sam Luchini Copywriter: Roger Baran
Production Director of Broadcast Production: Cindy Fluitt Executive Producer: Cat Reynolds Director of Graphic Services: Jim King
Account Associate Director, Account Management: Todd Grantham Account Director: Joel Giullian Account Manager: Varoon "V.J." Jain Assistant Account Manager: Laura Black
Strategy Group Brand Strategy Director: John Thorpe Brand Strategy Director: Brendan Robertson
Media Group Communication Strategy Director: Dong Kim Senior Communication Strategist: Nicole Richards
Production Company: eLevel Films Director: Brady Baltezore Executive Producers: P.J. Koll, James Horner Producer: Chris Whitney Director of Photography: Juli Lopez Stills Camera: Claude Shade
Postproduction: eLevel Post Producer: Katharine O'Hara Visual Effects Supervisor: Nathan Shipley Animation: Jessica Gibson Editor: Erik Johnson Assistant Editor: Quinn Moticka
Terrie Hall, who starred in Arnold's brutal national anti-smoking campaign for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, died this week in North Carolina. The image of Hall hiding the ravages of smoking-induced cancer with a wig, false teeth and a scarf is pretty harrowing, and the same can be said for her artificial voicebox. Those get used a lot in anti-smoking ads, but there's always something heartbreaking about them. I often wonder if people like Terrie are being exploited, if their real suffering should be harvested for a marketing effort, even one that's relevant to their condition. But the CDC says the campaign, called "Tips From Former Smokers," prompted 100,000 people to quit. "She was a public health hero," CDC director Dr. Tom Frieden said of Hall. "She may well have saved more lives than most doctors do." Hall was 53.
Say what you will about the iPhone 5C—the ads for it are gorgeous and bubbly. Apple this afternoon released the second 5C spot in the space of three days, this one a 55-second jaunt through another candyland. It's not quite as chocolatey as the first, but then, this spot focuses a bit more on what's inside the thing—not just on the edible polycarbonate exterior.
Smartphones are lovely, but they're also wasteful—not worth repairing when they break, quickly obsolete in a hyper-competitive market. But what if there were a different model, one where a phone's pieces could be easily removed, repaired, customized and upgraded? That's the idea behind the Phoneblok. It is (or would be—it hasn't been made yet) a smartphone made of detachable "bloks" connected to a base that locks everything together into a solid phone. If a blok breaks, you can replace it; if a blok gets old, you upgrade it. At the "Blokstore"—a kind of app store for hardware—you buy bloks, sell bloks, buy a pre-assembled phone or assemble your own by selecting the bloks made by brands you want to support. The idea, from Dutch designer Dave Hakkens, is pretty fascinating—even if critics say it's impractical and/or technologically infeasible. Phoneblok has undertaken a Thunderclap campaign to raise awareness, and is promising big things for Oct. 29. Meantime, check out phonebloks.com for more, and watch the video below. There's a reason it's gotten more than 12 million views in a week.
Looking for a tear-jerker today? Thai mobile company TrueMove has got you covered with this story of a noodle seller whose generous act toward a young boy with a sick mother brings unexpected rewards 30 years later.
With almost 6 million hits in just a few days, the ad is getting lots of press. The tagline is, "Giving is the best communication." It's not entirely clear (at least in the ad) how that relates to a mobile company, but frankly, it doesn't need to. The buzz (and the vague hope that it will encourage random acts of kindness among viewers) is all that really matters.
Oddly, instead of focusing on the story, a bunch of bloggers have latched onto the ad and are using it to start a flame war with American advertisers about why we can't come up with ads this moving and cinematic. Way to generalize, guys. I didn't see you talking about awesome Thai ads when they punked you last month with the hot chick who was a dude.
Remember the "Chimpanzee Riding on a Segway" song from way back in 2010? How about the theme song from Buffy the Vampire Slayer from the 1990s? Parry Gripp was the songwriter behind the simian parody, and the frontman of onetime geek-rock band Nerf Herder, which created the intro music for the supernatural TV show. Now, he's expanding his offbeat oeuvre into anti-asthma PSAs with a series of songs performed by a group of puppets named The Breathe Easies.
Created with agency The Barbarian Group for the Ad Council, the spots, running on radio and online in English and Spanish, feature titles like "Clean Up the Mold" and "Don't Smoke in the House." The lyrics include gems like, "Don't break my heart with your second-hand smoke"—an Auto-Tuned solo, of course. The bright pastels and tongue-in-cheek presentation—Pee-wee's Playhouse meets Sesame Street—succeed at making sad and gross subject matter less off-putting. And it's hard to blame them for playing the unapologetically cheesy jingle angle, given that the cause would be all but invisible otherwise.
And who doesn't want to spend the rest of the day humming to themselves about vacuuming the floor—especially if the alternative is singing about a cookie or a pickup truck?
Starring in this risky spot for Volvo Trucks might give Roland Svensson a big head. Luckily, the engineer's head measured only 10 inches high when he was buried up to his neck in the sand and let a Volvo FMX truck, which has 12 inches of space between the ground and its undercarriage, drive over him. (Volvo swears the stunt is real, but did tell the Huffington Post that some "Hollywood editing" was employed for visual enhancement.)
I prefer this brand of stuntvertising to the more mean-spirited, pseudo-reality pranks. The enthusiastic participation of the Volvo employees is more compelling than just surprising and upsetting unsuspecting people on the street or in offices. Plus, this latest stunt, while outlandish, does illustrate an actual design feature of the truck—its high-clearance suspension system, which the spot's star helped to develop. Conversely, most prankvertising campaigns serve up shocks and little else.
This particular bit of automotive daredevilry makes Svensson's boss, Volvo Trucks president Claes Nilsson—who delivered a sales pitch while standing on an FMX suspended high above a harbor—look like a spineless wimp by comparison. Man up, Claes—take some real risks!
Meanwhile, in a different video, also posted below, Charlie the hamster demonstrates the easy handling of Volvo's truck by actually steering one of the vehicles on a dangerously twisty Spanish quarry road. The little guy's understandably a bit fuzzy on the concept, so he's guided by a driver who dangles a carrot into his specially designed hamster wheel, which is attached to the truck's steering wheel.
Keyboard Cat, Snoop, Psy, the Winklevoss twins and Snooki were all in on the joke. Can the same be said for Dennis Rodman and the Prancercise lady? Oh sure, it's just the Wonderful Pistachios campaign revving up another round of zeitgeist-tapping absurdity. There's no apparent end to the reality-TV, pop-culture, animated and sports figures who will make themselves available for these ads. In fact, if this marketer doesn't ask how or why you do it—eat pistachios, that is—then you must not be very important. Rodman? He does it "because he's nuts," says the newest spot, in which the former NBA player turned diplomat appears with a less doughy version of Kim Jong-un (a look-alike) to hawk the healthy snack. And the Prancercise lady? Who can get enough of her spindly, energetic dancing? Next, somebody will have to twerk.
JetBlue Airways is launching a big new ad campaign from Mullen with the theme "Air on the Side of Humanity." But its big star isn't even human—he's a pigeon.
The 60-second launch spot is a documentary-style piece in which the pigeon—that most frequent of frequent fliers, and most underappreciated of birds—talks about how he flies in crowded spaces, gets crumbs for snacks and is generally ignored. Thus, he's a stand-in for the masses who, with ruffled feathers, shuffle onto rival planes and experience the worst of air travel. "There's got to be a way to fly with a little respect. You know?" our hero asks at the end, as the tagline appears on screen.
The campaign breaks first in Boston, where JetBlue has the most daily nonstop flights of any carrier, and includes TV spots (running in 39 prime-time season premieres), online advertising, microsites, mobile, social, experiential and out-of-home advertising. Most intriguingly, JetBlue is also partnering with Mobile Theory on a voice activation unit that will teach consumers "how to speak pigeon on their smartphones."
There's also a digital experience and social hub called Central Perch, where you can send messages to friends through virtual carrier pigeons on Facebook. Meanwhile, check out the launch spot and credits below.
CREDITS Client: JetBlue Airways Spot: "Air on the Side of Humanity"
Agency: Mullen Chief Creative Officer: Mark Wenneker Executive Creative Director Tim Vaccarino Executive Creative Director Dave Weist Group Creative Director Dylan Bernd Sr. Copywriter Jack Collier Writers: Evelynne Scholnick, Nick Olish Sr Art Director: Dan Madsen Art Directors: Jay Spahr, Mauricio Perez, Kara Noble Digital Designer: Scott Petrichko SVP, Creative Technologist: Christian Madden Creative Technologists: Dave Lee, Stefan Harris, Joe Palasek Executive Director of Integrated Production: Liza Near Head of Broadcast Zeke Bowman Producer Vera Everson Sr Digital Producer: Kim Ryan Digital Producers: Heidi Laidlaw, Charley Perkins Experience Designers: Hoon Oh Group Account Director Drayton Martin Account Director Jill Rugani Account Supervisor Hannah Moore, Cece Wedel Senior Account Executive Molly Barag Assistant Account Executive Vish Chandawarkar Animation Designer: Veronica Padilla QA: Ryan Nelson Copy Editors: Ashley Rumery, Eric Maus, Rebecca Rehbein Strategic Digital Analysts: Steve Sandiford, May Liu Sr Computer Artist Kathryn Lane Project Manager Niha Reddy Production Supervisor Mark Gardner SVP Group Media Director Keith Lusby VP Associate Media Director Chris McLaughlin Senior Media Planner Lauren Atkins Assistant Media Planner Charlie Weickert VP Group Digital Media Director Jade Watts Associated Digital Media Director Rachel Allen Digital Media Supervisor Erin Kelly Digital Media Planner Caroline Caterine Account Director PR Jaclyn Ruelle Account Supervisor PR Christina Simmons Account Executive PR Arianna Rubinstein SVP, Group Strategy Director Fredrik Sarnblad Senior Planning Analyst Chris Plating Senior Brand Strategist Lirra Schiebler
Production: Hungry Man Director Hank Perlman Executive Producer Mino Jarjoura Producer Martha English Director of Photography Tom Richmond
Editorial: P.S. 260 Producer Laura Lamb Patterson Editor JJ Lask Assistant Editor Colin Reilly, Joe Simmons
VFX: Brickyard Executive Producer Kirsten Andersen Lead VFX Artist Geoff McAuliffe, Jimi Simmons Animation Director Anders Beer
CG: General Gau & Brickyard VFX Executive Producer Kirsten Anderson
Music: Original Music by Human
Audio Post: Sound Lounge/Soundtrack Sound Design/Mixer Tom Jucarone, Glen Landrum, Mike Secher
Even though more than a century has passed since the Titanic sank, it's still too soon to joke about it in ads. Red Bull got in trouble for this ad hinting that the more than 1,500 people who drowned in April 1912 could have survived if they'd had the renowned energy drink aboard—because it "gives you wings." Don't worry. In Britain, the Ad Standards Authority was alerted, as 79 complaints have been lodged against the ad, including one from the Titanic Heritage Trust. Red Bull's slogan is OK—it's better than the more truthful "Red Bull tastes like mouthwash"—but maybe they shouldn't apply it to real historical disasters anymore. Go ahead and crumple up those Hindenburg sketches, fellas.
Apple has always been all or nothing when it comes to color. "1984" was all doom and gloom with just a flash of red running shorts. "Think Different" was mostly black and white. The TV work, from "Switchers" to "Get a Mac" to most iPhone demos, has been lots of stark white. And yet Apple loves color—from the five hues of the original iMac through all the gloriously vibrant iPod advertising. Now, Apple can celebrate color again, with the iPhone 5C (the C itself stands for color), and here's the first commercial for it—a trippy, drippy little production that visually enlivens a brand that's seemed quite ashen of late. Seemingly taking its cues from candy advertising, the spot shows the phones solidifying into shape out of flowing liquid—in footage that would make Nestlé proud. Perhaps this is why the phone is priced lower. In a pinch, you could try eating it.
AMC's Breaking Bad airs its last episode on Sept. 29, and the network whipped up this print ad promoting the series finale to thank the cast and crew for their efforts over the five seasons of the landmark series. The copy reads, "It was all in the chemistry. Thanks to everyone who made Bad so good." The ad shows the RV where Walter White and Jesse Pinkman cooked meth in the early days. Remember the episode where they couldn't get the clunker started and ended up stranded way out in the desert and nearly died? Yeah, that was a barrel of fun. Appropriately, in this ad, the sun is low in the sky. Indeed, once the series ends, the TV spectrum will be just a bit dimmer.
As for fans who can't let Breaking Bad go, well, they'd better call Saul.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
