Hasta La Creative!

Having some fun with Saturday Night Live’s CNN Pregnancy Test bit, home pregnancy test brand e.p.t. is exploring the creation of a series of limited-edition pregnancy test sticks that interact with women just like their favorite news programs.

Of the sticks, Jennifer Moyer, vice president of marketing for Insight Pharmaceuticals, parent company of e.p.t. said, “We all saw SNL’s sketch Saturday night announcing the new CNN Pregnancy Test, with its constant breaking alerts, even when there is no news to report. We think SNL has stumbled on a great idea, and we’d like to take it to the next level.”

Moyer said the company already has “in development” a series of news-branded pregnancy test stick prototypes, including:

– An NPR stick that offers ongoing in-depth analysis of your pregnancy, with intermittent pledge drives
– An MSNBC stick that blames conservatives if you’re unhappy with the result of your test, and credits liberals if you are pleased
– A FOX News stick that blames liberals if you’re unhappy with the result, and credits conservatives if you are pleased
– A CBS Sunday Morning stick that always delivers a moment in nature before you receive your result
– A Daily Show stick that streams pregnancy jokes
– A Colbert Report stick that will expire some time in 2015 (pending more information from David Letterman)
– And a special legacy Walter Cronkite news stick that appends every result – positive or negative – with the signature signoff “And that’s the way it is.”

Hey, products branded with pop-up cultural phenomenon? Why not?

To be clear, these are not actual products yet. Just another marketing stunt.

Arnold Worldwide has a new campaign launching the new Brushing Chews for Milk-Bone, which feature “a patented shape that has been developed over the past three years, earning them the trusted Veterinary Oral Health Council’s (VOHC) seal of approval.”

To introduce the new product, Arnold keeps it simple, telling the story of a man and his dog (Ted and Rudy), and explaining how their new Milk-Bone Brushing Biscuit is designed to work as well as a toothbrush to keep dogs’ teeth clean. Because no one wants to brush their dog’s teeth, this is a pretty effective selling point. Ted and Rudy’s story extends beyond the broadcast spot above to a series of online videos, all set against the red backdrop matching Milk-Bone’s packaging, and following roughly the same formula. The campaign strategy is based on the insight that “The more you care for your dog, the happier and healthier he’ll be.” Ted and Rudy’s relationship is intended to to be “funny and adorable” but arrives at something closer to “hokey, but kind of cute.”

“They’re very much a classic comedy duo, with Rudy being the straight man and Ted as the accidental comedian,” explains Arnold creative director Tristan Kincaid. “We put them on a bright red background to give them a simple but visually striking stage for them to tell their stories.”

The campaign also includes social elements, with each of the six online videos (which act as pre-roll video assets on sites including Hulu, AOL, Discovery, TubeMogul and Yahoo) featuring an end card driving traffic to Milk-Bone’s Facebook page. Future social posts will also include Instagram and Twitter. Stick around for credits and a pair of online spots after the jump. continued…

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Where’s the ball park? That’s one question that comes to mind after viewing Y&R New York’s patriotic spot for Ball Park’s new premium hot dog, Park’s Finest, the latest iteration of the “So American You Can Taste It” campaign. The other being: “Hey guys, are you sure you want to celebrate the invention of the cotton gin? It did kind of lead to the expansion of slavery in the Antebellum South.”

The goofy, 30-second spot, called “Greatest Invention Ever,” sees a man holding an eagle positing that Ball Park’s Park’s Finest are America’s greatest invention, much to the chagrin of Eli Whitney and Benjamin Franklin. Its ridiculous brand of humor seems somewhat studied, and mostly fails to hit the mark. The spot ends with a group of guys grilling up the new premium dogs, and, in a nice touch, the smoke forms a map of the United States. That there isn’t a ball park at any point in the spot feels like a miss though, as it’s a clear association with the brand. (And, hey, ties right in with the whole “greatest American invention” thing.)

The new Park’s Finest ads will air across broadcast and cable networks, as well as on Pandora radio, beginning this week. The larger “So American You Can Taste It” campaign also includes digital, social, shopper marketing and PR elements. Stick around for credits after the jump. continued…

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Last year, Amsterdam Worldwide was tapped to lead the Warsteiner Beer business, and their work with the brand can now be seen in their recent global brand platform, intended to “refresh the brand in its existing markets, and firmly establish it in emerging markets.”

The campaign, which kicked off in Germany on the 10th and will roll out gradually in over 60 markets worldwide, features television, print, and “high levels of digital media activity across the board.” Amsterdam Worldwide clearly wants to target the young and the young at heart (such as the 45 year-old skateboarder in the “Do It Right” television spot featured above), as evidenced by the online documentaries meant to supplement the television campaign which include profiles of a skydiver and a graffiti artist.

“Traditional beer advertising is cluttered with a lot of clichés and not particularly inspiring insights – we had a chance with Warsteiner to break away from that mould and celebrate a brand culture that lives and breathes an intense commitment to creating a truly premium beer,” explains Amsterdam Worldwide’ s Strategic Director, Uli Kurtenbach. “It was a natural step to inspire Warsteiner’s consumers to take on their own lives with the same enthusiasm.”

Stick around for credits and a profile of “Freefly Rob” after the jump. continued…

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Remember when beer was just this thing you drank on Saturday afternoon after you’d finished cutting the lawn or simply wanted to hang with a few friends at your favorite bar?

Well, thanks to modern marketing, beer isn’t beer anymore. It’s a lifestyle! Yes, a lifestyle. You don’t just consume beer any more. Nope, you consume the lifestyle the beer brand’s marketing team has created.

Trouble is, trying to live these epic lifestyles just makes one feel inadequate since most of us are never going to achieve the epic awesomeness we see in beer commercials, particularly this fast-paced collection of achievers who are part of a new Amsterdam Worldwide-created campaign for Warsteiner beer.

W+K Amsterdam have a launched a new, global World Cup 2014 campaign for Powerade, “the official sports drink of FIFA.”In addition to television, the campaign also includes print/out of home, digital, and online documentary films (more on that later).

“There’s Power in Every Game” centers around Andrés Iniesta, the Spanish star who scored the winning goal in the 2010 World Cup. He takes center stage in the 60-second spot (featured above), which also features five amateur athletes from around the world. Each of these athletes has “overcome challenges in their lives and in the process have lifted their teammates, rallied supporters and inspired communities through their dedication and achievements in the sport” — which exemplifies the campaign’s #PowerThrough message.

Each of these amateur athletes will be featured in their own documentary, starting with the inspirational story of Nicolai “Nico” Calabria. Debuted at the Kicking + Screaming Football Festival in New York last week and being released as a television spot in addition to its online release, the two minute film tells Nico’s story growing up with one leg and defying expectations to succeed as an athlete. Incorporating an impressively-edited mix of home video footage and live action film, it’s a powerful telling of Nico’s story, and well worth a watch.

“Nico’s story is one of unwavering determination,” said Brynn Bardacke, global group creative director for Powerade. “He truly embodies what we mean when we say there’s power in every player and power in every game.”

Stick around for “Nico & Powerade,” along with credits, after the jump. continued…

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W+K have just unveiled their latest FIFA World Cup 2014 spot for ESPN, raising excitement for the event with just about 2 months left until it kicks off in Brazil on June 12th.

Entitled “I Believe,” the 60-second spot attempts to pump up Americans for the event, which has gained popularity nationally in recent years. Shots of Team USA in action and crowd footage are accompanied by a chant of “I believe that we can win.” Given the odds against the American squad, “I believe that we can make it past group stage” seems a bit more realistic. Around the 53 second mark of the ad, a Nike “Just Do It” stadium billboard is clear in the background of the in-game action. Given that Nike is (of course) a W+K client, we can’t help but wonder if this was an intentional (and rather slick) move on W+K’s part.

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“So what do you think, you gonna take it?” asks a BMW salesman in KBS+P and production company O Positive’s new spot for the BMW 3-Series. This sends the man into a reverie of past regrets, from dumping a nerdy Brooklyn Decker in high school to passing up a chance to get in on the ground floor of Twitter. The 60-second spot, directed by David Shane is certainly memorable, showing the 3-Series in the beginning of the spot and linking passing up the opportunity to own it to some pretty poor decision making skills. Spoiler alert: the guy decides to buy it. “Regrets” is well produced, paced, and acted, effectively using humor to make a lasting impression. Just one thing though: Does anyone else find nerd Brooklyn Decker hotter than runway Brooklyn Decker, or is that just me?

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

GoldieBlox are back with another ad taking on gender stereotypes in children’s toys. You may remember GoldieBlox from their Beastie Boys parodying ad that subsequently led to a lawsuit.

This time around, GoldieBlox riffs on the classic “This Your Brain on Drugs” PSA with their own “This Is Your Brain on Engineering.” “This is your brain on princess,” says a girl in a white lab coat and fairy wings who dolls up an egg which she sends through a conveyer belt. The spot shares facts and statistics about girls’ math/science performance and body perception and women in engineering, such as “At age 7, girls begin to lose confidence in math and science,” “At age 13, over half of all girls are unhappy with their bodies,” and “Only 13% of engineers are women.” Mixed in with this are positive numbers about the increasing importance of engineering jobs in America. It’s an important message, delivered in a fun way, that should get parents thinking about how what toys their girls play with now might impact their future. And that, of course, could lead them to purchase GoldieBlox.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

The Most Interesting Man is bummed out. He’s depressed. He’s sad. Why? Because Cinco de Mayo falls on a Monday. A Monday! What a bummer! No one wants to party on a Monday. That’d be like trying to get the Geico Camel to do his Hump Day thing on a Saturday.

But the Most Interesting Man is, of course, Most Interesting because he always has a solution, an answer, a more exciting way of doing something. And so to stave off the Monday blahs, he’s come up with Dos de Mayo. Yup, that’s right. The party starts Friday and leads up to Monday.

The campaign comes complete with an inforgraphic celebrating Dos de Mayo, a Twitter hashtag (#dosdemayo) and a party in LA in partnership with Rolling Stone. It’s all to introduce Dos Equis new drink, the Dos-A-Rita.