New Zealand loves a good weather event. And Wellington felt the full force of natu… Hang on a minute, it seems as though the mainstream media has neglected to tell the people that the city was actually ‘attacked by a ravenous yellow goat’. Now that would make for a great Japanese monster movie.
According to a study in the UK, more than a third of 16 to 23-year-olds didn’t know that bacon came from pigs and four in ten failed to link milk with an image of a dairy cow. That lack of understanding around provenance is quite concerning, but Silver Fern Farms and Colenso BBDO embraced the farm to show consumers how easy they’ve made their lives with the ‘Going to Great Lengths’ campaign. And, with a win in the April round of Colmar Brunton’s Ad Impact Award, it seems to have worked.
There’s crazy and then there’s John McAfee crazy. The millionaire founder of McAfee Antivirus gives the world’s craziest how to video on uninstalling the software that long ago made him crazy rich (keyword being crazy).
BNZ Bank is putting the call out for New Zealand’s best short story writers, with a Facebook app that turns prose into art.
He’s been on the wall for Daikin, he’s been on a bike for Rexona, he’s been in a video with his dad for Adidas, and he’s been in his undies for Jockey, but brands just can’t get enough of the commercial dream that is Dan Carter, so now he is trying to keep up with a working mum in a new spot for Healtheries.
Orcon has released an app for iOS and Android (developed by Kiwi dev shop Sush) which lets its users take their homes phones with them, where ever they are in the world.
DraftFCB has continued its golden run at Cannes, with Prime TV’s Call Girl winning two golds in Radio, while Alt Group takes two silvers in Design.
Fisher & Paykel has just kicked off the global launch of 70 new locally-designed products with a roadshow in New Zealand and one of its first TV campaigns in a while. But while progress and innovation is laudable, some old features deserve to stay. And this little patriotic easter egg is one of them.
Telecommunications upstart 2degrees is preparing to take on Vodafone and Telecom on the 4G battlefront, rolling out a high speed mobile data network in early 2014 with the help of a $165 million cash injection from BNZ Bank.
Beer drinkers who want to take a step towards becoming beer connoisseurs can now look forward to Lion’s latest content marketing campaign on TVNZ.
The Depot took out Metro’s supreme restaurant of the year award in 2012, and it’s a popular haunt for marcomms power lunchers. And now Al Brown has produced a skite film courtesy of Alex McVinnie Photography and Reel Good that aims to capture the essence of the place.
We’ve featured Crown Range Drifting, bike races with Peregrine Falcons, men jumping from the edge of space, Rube Goldberg antics and plenty more Red Bull tomfoolery on this site in the past. And you can add another work of extreme art to the list with Danny MacAskill’s Imaginate, which sees the freakishly talented bike artist play with a few toys.
Day two was a good one from a New Zealand perspective. And Day 3 wasn’t too bad either, with one silver, a few bronzes and plenty of shortlistings.
Contagion’s relationship with Air New Zealand cheeky little brother Grabaseat was enhanced last week after winning a competitive pitch against several other agencies thought to have included Special Group and Young & Shand.
Mitre 10 Dream Home returns to Kiwi screens on 2 July at 7.30pm after a few year hiatus. And, along with the naming rights sponsor, TVNZ has signed up a host of other commercial partners who will spruik their wares in the TV2 show, including ASB, EECA Energywise and plenty more.
Switching power companies is easy. Dealing with wild beasts, not so much.
Y&R New Zealand got some good news today when it found out it had won a bronze lion at Cannes for the MetService’s Weather to Wake app. And it’s got some more good news to announce: the appointment of experienced advertising campaigner Abbe Hale as general manager.
Land Rover started off not long after World War II when a farmer in the UK stripped a battered army jeep and decided to build something more appropriate. 65 years on and the cars are certainly a whole heap more luxurious, but the brand hasn’t forgotten its roots, and Big Communications is showcasing this evolution with a new campaign that has given the international creative a local twist.
The sequels to the nerdtacular kids book My Little Geek has reached its US$10,000 funding goal on Kickstarter with a week left to go.
Daniel Robertson replaces The Radio Network commercial director (via Yahoo New Zealand) Laura Maxwell-Hansen as chairperson, who left the position in May.
The first winners have been announced, and there are a few Kiwi agencies in the money, with DDB NZ winning a prestigious Creative Effectiveness Lion for Steinlager’s ‘Believe’, DraftFCB NZ picking up seven lions so far for Driving Dogs and Call Girl and Colenso BBDO winning gold for Amnesty International’s Trial by Timeline. Plus: more Kiwi agencies on shortlists.
Marketers love to throw around health-related buzz words to confuse naive consumers into thinking what they’re buying is good for them. Of course all natural might not mean the same thing for everyone, as this beefy ad selling sausages shows us.
In April this year, international media reported on the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) decision to refuse registration for Apple’s iPad Mini trademark on the grounds it’s simply descriptive. But within days of the story breaking, the USPTO was backtracking on its decision.
Changes to postal services—and NZ Post’s reluctance to budge on price—are pushing direct marketers down the digital path, says Ben Goodale.
It’s been a rough few years for New Zealand Post, with the decline in traditional mail leading to a number of restructures, the sale of assets and plenty of cost cutting. And there’s more change on the horizon, with comms manager John Tulloch saying there’s “a bit of a realignment going on” across various parts of the business at the moment, including the marketing team.
Tabloid newspaper The Truth may shut its doors after more than 125 years of publishing – this in a shocker week for New Zealand media where Fairfax Media axed three of its technology titles and MediaWorks was put into receivership.
60 years ago there were 130 delegates at the first year of the Cannes Lions and no entries from New Zealand). This year it’s estimated there will be 12,000 attendees and, if last year is anything to go by, a few Kiwi winners. And to celebrate the evolution of the world’s pre-eminent marcomms festival, Sapient Nitro created this infographic.
There were a record 35,765 entries from 92 countries for the 60th Cannes Lions. Of course, we’re small-minded and patriotic so we’re focusing on the Kiwi contenders and here are the seven agencies in the running after the first shortlists for Creative Effectiveness, PR, Promo & Activation and Direct were announced.
New Zealand’s second largest free-to-air broadcaster MediaWorks has been placed into receivership this morning – a very strange arrangement that will see the company change owners and shed massive amounts of debt, without losing a single job. Although the tax man might come off worse from this deal.
Sim Ahmed tags along with the Google X team behind Project Loon, documenting through photos the mad (but oddly brilliant) science experiment being conducted by one of the biggest companies in the world, right in the heart of the South Island.