Hasta La Creative!

The Martin Agency launched a new campaign for Geico entitled “It’s Not Surprising” with the launch spot “Marco Polo.”

Unsurprisingly, the spot features an actor representing the famous 13th century Venetian merchant traveler. As you also may have guessed, the set-up involves a group of children in a pool playing the game Marco Polo. Polo responds with “Si, scusi,” but figures things out soon enough.

This is, of course, exactly what we’ve come to expect from The Martin Agency’s work for Geico. The predictable set-up and joke lead into a message about how it’s surprising to be playing Marco Polo in a pool with Marco Polo but how much you can save by switching to Geico is (by now) no surprise. Of course, that message is undercut by the fact that, by now, the former is expected, at least in a Geico ad. That also limits the effectiveness of the spot.

The spot makes its broadcast debut nationally today, in 30 and 15-second versions and will be supported by digital and social efforts. It will also coincide with two new spots in the agency’s “It’s What You Do” campaign for the brand.

“Multiple storylines allow us to go into different worlds and pull out what we’re trying to push,”  The Martin Agency group creative director Wade Alger explained to AdAge. “Because of the amount of media in our spend, it’s nice to have multiple storylines out there to avoid burnout on our brand.”