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Phantom shines a light on the history of Bacardi

The TVC for Bacardi’s campaign was shot in colourful Havana and told the story of all fate threw at the Bacardi family throughout its years in Cuba where it survived natural disasters, prohibition and finally exile from Cuba in the early days of the communist revolution.

The ad is based on the street, with the protagonist walking through time and relaying all the family endured and how the brand still endures today. 

ZenithOptimedia’s business manager Kate Gamble says it chose to work with Phantom because of the outdoor company’s revamped inventory and great locations.

She says the use of street-level posters were effective.

“The posters were placed together to effectively take over each location. The creative drew in the eye with high impact imagery and multi-sized copy. Viewers could spend as little or long as they wanted engaging with the ‘Untameable’ message.”

Phantom business development manager Dan Collins says he and the Phantom team took advantage of some of their best locations to unleash the full impact of the creative.

“Bacardi wanted to take advantage of changing locations every week, thus giving them extra reach. We also did site takeovers on locations for extra impact.”

He says site takeovers worked well with this particular campaign, which included a bunch of colourful, eye-catching imagery. “What appealed was the ability to run multiple creative, so you see a few different images lined up together to tell a story. So taking advantage of the multi-creative was pretty cool.”

Collins says Phantom also put up large-format posters for best effect.

The Bacardi campaign was also the testing ground for Phantom’s new top-mounted LED lights, which it has since installed in high visibility areas and will continue to roll out across the country.

The inability to see the posters at night has previously been a weak point for Phantom—particularly at a time when digital outdoor advertising sites are popping up all over the city like fireflies during mating season.  

Phantom general manager James Holloway says Phantom is conscious that posters are a 24/7 medium so it wanted to make sure its advertisers got the full benefit of that.

“By providing warm LED lighting we can highlight the advertiser’s image and ensure it gets seen by as many people as possible, throughout the evening as well as during daylight hours.”

At first Phantom will erect the posters in its most-visible areas and will install more top-mounted LED lights each month.

“We’ve worked hard with local councils to get our sites permitted and protected,” says Holloway. “They can see the benefit in lighting, as it helps make the streets a more attractive place. And in winter, everyone appreciates a little more.” 

In an earlier interview with NZ Marketing Phantom founder Jim Wilson said Phantom would be in digital media, but perhaps (for now) it’s found a cheaper solution.

“[You need what] David Ogilvy once said is a ‘unique selling proposition’ and what our unique selling proposition is, is that we’re on the street. So we would be putting digital signage on the streets and that’s one thing that I’ll be investigating when I’m in Vienna next week, and when I’m in Paris the week after. I’ll be looking at how they do it and meeting with those companies. But I mean, digital media will leave an enormous footprint on this city in the fullness of time and we would be part of it, we would want to be part of it,” Wilson said.

Phantom has already bridged the gap between the physical and digital with other campaigns. In 2012 it put QR codes at the bottom of its ads, dubbing them the ‘Talking Posters’.

When scanned, the code directed users to a mobile-optimised and responsive website that dynamically scaled itself to fit the dimensions of the user’s device.

Whether it’s embracing a quirky piece of tech or shining a light on its sites, Phantom is consistently looking for ways to keep its product in line with the changing demands of consumers. But while change is inevitable, you can rest assured that Phantom will always retain the rebellious edge that has until now typified its brand.  

  • This article is part of a content partnership with Phantom. 
  • ​If you would like to work with Phantom Billstickers visit here

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