Hasta La Creative!

After winning creative duties for New York Life late late year, following a review launched in April, Anomaly has launched its first work for the client.

The campaign, “Be Good At Life,” will launch with a 30-second spot starring comedian and onetime Daily Show regular Demetri Martin entitled “Welcome to the World.”

In the spot, Martin advises, “Better start saving for college tuition” as the scene shifts back and forth between Martin calmly gardening and a man nervously looking on as his wife gives birth. “But you don’t have to think about that right now,” Martin adds, “because New York Life can help you manage your family’s financial future.”

The spot will make its broadcast debut this Saturday and run in 60, 30 and 15-second versions. It’s a bit of a strange approach, to say the least. The juxtaposition of Martin’s gardening and the chaotic birthing scene seems designed to grab attention, while Martin’s involvement in the first place seems obviously designed to attract a certain demographic.

“We have made a choice to focus more specifically on the maturing millennials market because we believe it’s so important to break through and win their attention to encourage our ability to grow and their ability to have access to financial security,” New York Life senior vice president, chief communications and marketing officer Kelli Parsons told AdAge, adding that Martin only signed on for the launch spot but may appear in future ads. 

In addition to being Anomaly’s first effort for the brand, “Be Good At Life” marks New York Life’s first campaign since “Keep Good Going” in 2012. Code and Theory, which was named the brand’s digital agency last December, has redesigned the brand’s website as part of the campaign’s digital push. The campaign also includes OOH elements in cities including New York.

When last we heard from Audi and Venables Bell & Partners, the agency/client turned to Iggy Pop to convince us that intelligence and innovation are today’s version of punk and that tech innovators are the new rock stars.

The new spot is quite different. It (sort of) celebrates Audi’s status as a returning Emmy’s sponsor but focuses more on the company’s new partnership with the ubiquitous Airbnb.

Emmy viewers and others will have a chance to experience the life of this badass dude, who only drives an Audi, only drinks fair trade artisanal coffee, and chooses to spend his time scheduling family trips to the hippest spot in Nevada: the middle of Death Valley.

Dude feels the need for speed. He also has some nostalgia for old school things like New York Times paper delivery, but his kids seem a little bored as the son plays with dangerous animals and the daughter tries hard to kill their monthly data plan. Why wouldn’t this guy leave his kids with the in-laws, we wonder?

The circumstances behind this narrative are fictional, but the house is real — even if its current purpose is to promote the Audi R8.

Some details: renters can stay in that house for the low price of $610 per night, but they can’t bring a dog, check in after 3 PM, smoke a cigarette, throw a party or invite kids aged 0 to 12. So the guy above is blatantly flaunting the rules while taking the opportunity to enjoy the “Audi VIP treatment,” which amounts to “one day of driving – all under the masterful eye of some of our best driving instructors” along with “a chance to experience 0-60 mph in 3.2 seconds.”

This house doesn’t include an address or, presumably, a working wi-fi connection. But it does have an R8 parked in the dusty driveway, and “nearly every star in the sky can be seen at night, offering the experience of a lifetime.” Winners’ meals will be prepared by a personal chef before some unspecified “evening entertainment/activities.”

The work doesn’t have much to do with the Emmys, but it will debut during the ceremony on Sunday. Regarding the ceremony itself, the question is not which shows will win but how many more awards will go to Game of Thrones than all other contenders combined.

CREDITS

CLIENT NAME: Audi of America
BRAND: Audi
SPOT NAME: Desolation
AIR DATE: 9/18/16
AGENCY: Venables Bell & Partners
EXECUTIVE CREATIVE DIRECTOR: Will McGinness
CREATIVE DIRECTOR: Justin Moore, Erich Pfeifer
ASSOCIATE CREATIVE DIRECTOR, COPYWRITER: Matt Miller
ASSOCIATE CREATIVE DIRECTOR, ART DIRECTOR: Matt Keats
SENIOR ART DIRECTOR: Kyle Jones
DIRECTOR OF INTEGRATED PRODUCTION: Craig Allen
SENIOR PRODUCER: Matt Flaker
PRODUCTION COMPANY: MJZ
DIRECTOR: Craig Gillespie
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY: Phillip Lesourd
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Emma Wilcockson
PRODUCER: Martha Davis
EDITING COMPANY: Final Cut Editorial
HEAD OF PRODUCTION/FINAL CUT: Suzy Ramirez
EDITOR: Crispin Struthers
MUSIC COMPANY: Human
COMPOSER: James Leibow
CREATIVE DIRECTOR: Craig DeLeon
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Jonathan Sanford
SOUND DESIGN AND MIX: 740 Sound
MIXER: Chris Pinkston
SOUND DESIGNERS: Chris Pinkston, A. Josh Reinhardt, Rob Marshall
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Scott Ganary
PRODUCER: Jeff Martin
ASSOCIATE PRODUCER OF MIX: Geena Richard
VFX/FINISH: Framestore
COLORIST: Beau Leon
VFX SENIOR EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: James Razzall
VFX SENIOR PRODUCER: James Alexander
VFX CREATIVE DIRECTOR: Alex Thomas
HEAD OF BRAND MANAGEMENT: David Corns
BRAND DIRECTORS: Chris Bergen, Ally Humpherys
ASSISTANT BRAND MANAGER: Bri Jones
PROJECT MANAGER: Talya Fisher, Leah Murphy

Office of Baby, the New York agency founded by GS&P veteran Paul Caiozzo and partners, has launched the first-ever global campaign for Etsy, the online marketplace where you can buy everything from a taxidermy beetle playing the banjo to cat hair jewelry to elephant boxers (complete with strategically placed trunk).

While the Brooklyn-based company has expanded its site to include 54 million members and 35 million products, it has yet to launch a comprehensive ad campaign. That’s where Office of Baby and “Difference Makes Us” comes in. The work focuses on two types of everyday items — mugs and bedside tables — to demonstrate how seemingly minute differences in personal taste help define who we are.

Both “Mugs” and “Table” were shot on iPhones, allowing Etsy sellers to match the vignettes and edit in their own products, and set to music by 90-year old children’s folk singer Ella Jenkins. “Mugs” opens on a woman using a floral design mug to catch rain water from a leaky roof, before showing a woman grabbing the last mug in the office break room (which happens to say “Best Dad Ever”) before her coworker walks in. Other mugs in the spot include a “Big Hug Mug,” rainbow mug, some kind of fantasy-themed mug, the requisite cat mug and a smiley face mug. 

“Bedside Tables” applies a similar approach to the furniture staple. The variety of styles of bedside table all say something about their owner, particularly when it’s revealed what’s inside them and how neatly (or not) they are kept.

“When we started collaborating, the idea of Difference Makes Us felt natural, coming right out of the core of what Etsy has always been doing,” Office of Baby creative director Paul Caiozzo said in a statement. “It was an incredible honor to work with Etsy, a company that’s been celebrating creativity and uniqueness since its inception.”

The approach makes a lot of sense for the brand, for which uniqueness and individuality is a distinct selling point. After all, where else can you buy a four-foot long carrot body pillow?

CREDITS

Client: Etsy
Campaign: Difference Makes Us

Agency: Office of Baby
Creative: Nathan Frank, Paul Caiozzo, Kate Wadia
Producer: Chris Patton
Music: Ella Jenkins
Music Label: Smithsonian Folkways Recordings
Edit: Kathy Gatto
Colorist: Jason Crump
Sound Design + Mix: Geoff Strasser
Animation: Jason Jones

SS+K launched a pair of PSAs for the NCAA, entitled “Done” and “Two Percent.”

“Done” addresses issues of gender diversity, with various female athletes saying their “done” with the need for female empowerment messages. Athletes including volleyball player (and three time Olympic gold medalist) Misty May Treanor, three-time Olympic swimmer Natalie Coughlin Hall and WNBA stars Nneka Ogwumike and Chiney Ogwumike all express the sentiment that “We shouldn’t need commercials to tell you you’re powerful.”

Clearly inspired by a rash of such femvertising, the spot declares that these athletes, and many others, are over it. After all, “Genders don’t play sports, athletes do.”

“The flip side of an ad that says ‘women [can] do anything’ is that you’re saying you believed they couldn’t,” explained SS+K senior art director Alyssa Georg. “We’re pointing out that women have already reached the top of sports.”

The NCAA would do well not to ignore issues of gender inequality, however, since as recently as 2014 female athletes received ten percent less in NCAA scholarship dollars than their male counterparts. 

Another spot features former San Francisco 49ers wide receiver Jerry Rice explaining that only two percent of NCAA athletes turn pro. But while 98 percent of NCAA college athletes won’t receive a professional contract, brand endorsements or private jet, he claims they’ll all receive something even more valuable: a college education. Sallie Mae agrees!

Credits:
Creative Agency – SS+K
Partner, Co-Founder – Rob Shepardson
Partner, Chief Creative Officer – Bobby Hershfield
Director of Production + Innovation – John Swartz
Senior Producer – Pamela Shulman
Senior Art Director – Alyssa Georg
Senior Copywriter – Elena Knox
Business Manager – Sarah Giarraffa
VP, Account Director – Jennifer Barr

Talent – Extreme Reach
Talent Manager – Vincent DeVito
Celebrity- Business Affairs Account Manager – Melissa Mathias

Production Company – Superprime
Managing Director/Executive Producer – Rebecca Skinner
Managing Director/Sales – Michelle Ross
Managing Director – John Lesher
Head of Production/Executive Producer – Roger Zorovich
Director/DP – Samuel Bayer
Underwater Camera Op – Bob Settlemire
Photographer – John Clark
Executive Producer – Dave Kemp
Production Supervisor – Piazzie
Asst. Production Supervisor – Shaun Daniels
Asst. Production Supervisor – Joshua Fallon
Director Asst – Jillian Dierenfield
Assistant Director – Michael Kahn
Assistant Director – Gail Shand
AC – Rich Hama
AC – Noah Glazer
D.I.T. – Adrian Jebef
Gaffer – Sean Ginn
BB Electric – Gregory Shummon
3rd Electric – Brandon Delgado
Electric – Jose Martinez
Electric – Robbie Poulliot
Key Grip – Matt Blum
BB Grip – Seong Dilg
Grip – Jeff Brack
Grip/DRVR – Dewayne Richardson
Prop Master – Scott DeSantis; Michael Zephro
Art – Mike McCabe
Script Supervisor – Ana Maria Quintano
Sound Mixer – Moe Chamberlain
Sound Boom – Ron Sherouse
Teleprompter – Debora Parga
VTR – Matt Hillyer
Make up – Angeline Fox
Key Costumer – Steph Strate
Costumes 2nd
– Tai Kohen
Costumes 3rd
– Gabrielle Levinson
Location Manager/Scout – John Rizzi
Gang Boss – Billy Dawson
Catering – Chris Tersaakyan
Craft Service – Rhonda Johnson
Medic – Chris Lum
Production Assistant LEAD – Cindy Garcia
Production Assistants – Angel Cituentes, Lucio Michel, Julio
Bay, Gabe Zepeda, Eric Valdez, Danita Clark, Wendy Montoya, Christian Clark, Bryce Pascual

Editing/Post Production Company – Arcade Edit
Jeff Ferruzzo– Editor
Matt Ferran– Asst. Editor
Sila Soyer– Partner, Executive Producer
Gavin Carroll – Senior Producer
Tristan Wake– On-line edit/VFX

Frame Store
Beau Leon – Telecine

Heard City
Jodi Levine – Mixer

Music – tonefarmer
Founder / Partner –
Ray Loewy
President / Partner – Tiffany Senft
Executive Producer – Liz Higgins

Spot – “2%”
Track – “Endorsement Feels”
Composer – Dan Sammartano

Spot – “Done”
Track – “Arms Akimbo”
Composer – Jimmy Harned

Preacher, the Austin-based agency launched by Mother New York alums in 2014, launched a “Pony Up on Venmo” campaign for PayPal-owned peer-to-peer payment service Venmo with a series of national broadcast spots that debut this week. 

As you perhaps guessed, the spots play on the phrase, making use of actual ponies. That approach allowed Preacher to tie the selling points of a brand that not all viewers will be familiar with to the memorable (and ridiculous) image of full-grown adults on very tiny ponies.

In “Rally Cry,” for example, a group of friends argue over whose turn it is to pay the bill outside a bar when one friend steps up to give a speech about how “happy hour should end happy” and they can easily split the bill with Venmo app. In addition to “Rally Cry,” which will run in both 30 and 15-second versions on networks including Comedy Central and MTV, there are also a series of 15-second spots exploring how different friends from “Rally Cry” use Venmo to pay for things like fancy camping, smoothies and pizza.

“Pony Up” follows on the heels of CP+B L.A.’s “Unboxing Venmo + Expert Brad Hall Review” in July. In addition to broadcast, the campaign, which will run for two months, also includes OOH and social media activations.

“This is our opportunity to drive awareness and to showcase our personality,” Venmo marketing director Kasia Leyden told AdAge. “It came together in a really clear way as a rallying cry against those awkward moments of having to ask someone to pay you back.”

In Goody, Silverstein & Partners newest spot for Adobe, a fictional basketball player named Anton Miller is about to sign a billion dollar contract with fictional professional basketball team the Cincinnati Sabers. The team’s executives and lawyers meet Miller and company in a conference room as Miller waits for them to provide a seemingly endless array of signatures before it’s his turn to sign.

While he’s waiting, he receives, and accepts, an offer from an opposing team. Bad news for Cincinnati. The spot concludes with the line “How’s your customer experience? We can help.”

The spot manages to promote the Adobe Sign feature, as well as Adobe’s customer service offerings in general with the exaggerated illustration of manual signatures gone wrong. Coming on the heels of April’s “Snake Bite,” it’s the latest in the series of reliably clever efforts from Goody, Silverstein & Partners for the brand, injecting humor into a category where you wouldn’t expect it. While “Billion Dollar Contract” may not live up to some of its predecessors it’s still a welcome addition to the campaign, and is about as entertaining as a spot for an e-signature platform gets. The spot will make its broadcast debut on TNT during the network’s launch of the NBA season, which begins October 25.

Credits:
Client: Adobe
Chief Marketing Officer: Ann Lewnes
VP, Experience Marketing Group: Alex Amado
Executive Creative Director: Steve Gustafson
Sr. Creative Director for Video: Dan Cowles
Director of Advertising and Production: Joel Giullian
Title of Creative Work: “Billion Dollar Player”
Live Date: 9/12/16
Agency: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
Co-Chairmen: Rich Silverstein and Jeff Goodby
Chief Creative Officer: Margaret Johnson
Creative Director: Will Elliott
Creative Director: Patrick Knowlton
Creative Director: Roger Baran
Creative Director: Sam Luchini
Art Director: Jasper Yu
Art Director: Stefan Copiz
Copywriter: Alex Maleski
Director of Content Production: Tod Puckett
Senior Producer: Benton Roman
Production Coordinator: Rachel Newman
Managing Partner: Brian McPherson
Account Director: Theo Abel
Account Manager: Chelsea Bruzzone
Assistant Account Manager: Zack Piánko
Director of Brand Strategy: Bonnie Wan
Brand Strategist: Etienne Ma
Brand Strategist: Andrew Mak
Director of Communication Strategy: Christine Chen
Communication Strategy Deputy Director: Dong Kim
Senior Communication Strategist: Caitlin Neelon
Communication Strategist: Natalie Williamson
Junior Communication Strategist: Chloe Bosmeny
Business Affairs Manager: Heidi Killeen
Director of Music: Todd Porter
Reset (Production)
Director: Adam Hashemi
Managing Director: Dave Morrison
Executive Producer: Jeff McDougall
Bidding Producer: Jenn Ingalls
Head of Production: JP Columbo
Producer: Michelle Currinder
Rock Paper Scissors (Editor)
Producer: Charlyn Derrick
Editor: Olivier Bugge Coutte
Barking Owl (Music)
Sound Designer – Michael Anastasi
Mixer – Patrick Navarre
Music – Barking Owl
Creative Director – Kelly Bayett
The Mill (Post FX)
Senior Producer: Will Unterreiner
2D Lead: Tara Demarco

DDB Sydney launched a new broadcast campaign for the ŠKODA Octavia, touting the vehicle as ‘For Those Who Buy the Car, Not the Ad.”

A series of ads center around the theme of car ad clichés. Chances are viewers of all kinds will be familiar with these tropes, from orchestral soundtrack to “that look” every male driver seems to give when cornering a turn, to standing and pointing at a scenic overlook with the car in the background to suspiciously well-behaved children in the back seat.

“Life is a journey,” begins the stereotypical voiceover in one 60-second spot, continuing “It doesn’t matter where you’re going.” Then the voiceover is interrupted by an actress in the passenger seat turning to the camera and saying, “You’re not seriously buying all this are you?”

She points out that she just met the actor playing her husband that morning and that the “real parents” of the “unnaturally well-behaved” children in the backseat must be proud. Near the end of the spot she gets to the point of the effort, saying, “But strip all of this away and what are you really paying for? A car. Wouldn’t you prefer yours to come with everything but the clichés?”

Other spots in the campaign mostly follow a similar formula. In one ad the director is shown giving some rather morbid advice to child actors while touting the vehicle’s safety. Another shows the same couple from the first spot at a scenic location while the actress contrasts the need for car ads to appear sexy with the utility of some of the car’s features.

While the sarcastic, meta approach to advertising is becoming widespread enough to risk becoming a cliché itself, it’s not yet all that ubiquitous in the automotive category. The types of clichés the spot mocks are also rampant enough that any viewers will be very familiar with them and able to spot them in other ads after seeing DDB Sydney’s effort. That should make “For Those Who Buy the Car, Not the Ad” memorable, especially for those lulled into the false sense of sameness at the beginning of the spots.

“It’s not anti-category,” DDB Group Australia managing partner Amanda Wheeler explained to LBB. “It’s anti-cliché.”

“I thought: ‘This is brilliant! Why has no-one thought of it before?’ Initially we wanted to do a more conventional ad which points outs the merits of the car, but another way of doing it was found and it’s one we couldn’t resist,” added ŠKODA Australia managing director Michael Irmer. “I think now that this will make you think of ŠKODA every time you see one of those car brands that uses the clichés.”

Credits:
Agency: DDB Sydney
Chief Creative Officer: Toby Talbot/Ben Welsh
Copywriter: Sam Pascoe
Art Director: Jason Woelfl
Managing Partner: Amanda Wheeler
Creative Partner: Steve Jackson, Ant Melder, Michael Barnfield

Production Company/Post Production: Finch
Producer: Sarah Cook
Director: Jae Morrison
Editorial and Online: Tim Mauger

Music Agency: Nylon Studios
Sound Design: Stuart Welch

Media Agency: Mediacom

When we think of the word “creativity,” professional athletes are not the first people who come to mind unless, perhaps, they double as pop stars, fashion designers or memoirists.

Success in sports is all about a winning combination of inborn talent, practice and self-discipline, right? Probably. But maybe there’s also something of an art to it. 72andSunny’s newest spot for Adidas argues that any authentic athlete also needs a bit of that wild style.

This kind of makes sense given that every athlete is now also a “brand,” Even Marshawn “I Don’t Give a Shit” Lynch.

So this is a dig at Under Armour, which is somehow perceived to be all about training and becoming the world’s greatest at some given task like Michael Phelps or Tom Brady.

The spot features a bunch of athletes we don’t necessarily recognize who are famous for being famous in addition to being good at the thing they get paid to do. The last lines ask, “If you call yourself an athlete, create something. Why are you even here?” That would be beyond, you know, playing an organized game to the best of your ability with the ultimate goal of defeating your opponents and justifying your ridiculously inflated salary.

Lots of athletes want to be noticed, though. It’s a little hard to stand out when everybody does a fancy dance in the end zone. As the not-hero of that classic consumerist propaganda film The Incredibles put it: “When everyone’s super … no one is.”

Cue maniacal laughter.

Back in the day, circa 1987, our friend’s older sister walked in on us playing Dungeons & Dragons and then ran to tell her mom, saying — and we quote word for word here — “Ma! They’re playing the devil’s game!!” (She goes to church a lot. You get it.)

Fun times for all from a time when you had to draw pictures of your characters and their gear instead of just checking out the awesome graphics on Fallout 3 or whatever the hot RPG is right now. We are now recalling our massive bag of colored pencils and feeling nostalgic…

Irvine’s E/LA agency and client Obsidian call on that same Way Back Machine for a new campaign promoting the latter’s Pathfinder Adventures mobile game in a new spot that also recall some scenes in the Netflix show Stranger Things, which was really quite well done if you haven’t seen it.

Agency and client go all-in as the press release begins: “The 80s called. They want their campaign back.” It continues, “this campaign invites viewers on a journey back to a simpler time and place—your parent’s living room.” And there are some very nice details here for 80s kids.

ECD Carlos Musquez writes, “It’s fun to look back to look forward. We felt there was something so intriguing about launching an iPhone/Android version of a game inspired by Dungeons & Dragons, which debuted at a time when the 80s brick phone was the hottest tech in town.”

The video spot will run in :30 and :15 versions (which were shot in 4:3 aspect ratio, of course), as YouTube pre-rolls and Facebook/Instagram posts.

E/LA partner and VP Pakko De La Torre-Rocha (a veteran of Deutsch, TBWA, Saatchi and pretty much every other creative shop in L.A.) ended his pitch, “We are going to play Atari 2600 at my house and you’re invited hermano.”

Dude, if only you lived in Brooklyn.

At the beginning of August, Wild Turkey named Matthew McConaughey as the brand’s “creative director,” undoubtedly earning a series of eyerolls from actual advertising professionals, while awarding its creative business to JWT. Now JWT New York has launched its first work for the new client, in collaboration with the celebrity “creative director” and production company RSA Films.

The resulting spot, “The Journey Begins,” is pretty indistinguishable from your average ad for a liquor brand, minus the actor’s presence. McConaughey provides voiceover as well as appearing in the ad, opening with the line “We’re not in a rush to be most popular, not in a rush not to be” over the requisite pour shot. The Wild Turkey on the rocks is then brought through a scene of a room dancing to a brass band to McConaughey himself, who’s playing a piano.

It’s nothing revolutionary by any means, but at the same time it’s not terrible. There are some interesting choices in the way it’s shot, such as the camera mostly following the perspective of the person bringing McConaughey his drink. Without McConaughey’s involvement the ad would probably bot being generating as much attention, but then that’s why Wild Turkey hired the “creative director” in the first place.

Should you doubt McConaughey’s involvement in the creative process, take a gander at the below photo of the actor directing a shot.

From the man himself: “I want to be reincarnated as a jaguar. Jaguars are keen and they’re perfectly poised. I’d sure love to be that well designed.”

Yeah, he said that, bro.