Hopefully you’ve already expanded your marketing mind and devoured the November/December edition of NZ Marketing from cover to cover, but in case you missed it, here’s a rundown of the joys you can behold if you get yourself a copy, including the entertaining and enlightening advertising goose chase that ensued in our quest to interview one of New Zealand advertising’s most intriguing characters, Ogilvy’s Greg Partington.
For some time now Ogilvy’s executive creative director Damon O’Leary has been talking about changing his working relationship to that of a contractor. And, as a result, from January 2012, he will move away from his day to day role to provide senior creative and strategic consultancy resource on a project by project basis.
1-1, CRM and loyalty agency justONE is on a bit of a roll at the moment and, following on from the big launch of the long-awaited Farmers Club, it has picked up two new juicy bits of below-the-line business: Ziera shoes and Mercury Energy.
There’s been a lot of chatter about the benefits of sponsorship and the threat of ambush marketing over the past few months. Some believed the All Blacks were a more valuable property to be associated with, others believed the Rugby World Cup was worth the sizable investment. So we were interested to see this Nielsen data showing which brands the hoi polloi perceived as sponsors of the event in June and then again in October.
Doing its bit to represent the Wellington creative scene at the Best Awards, digital agency Resn picked up a Purple Pin in Interactive Design for its American-based virtual racing car application called Sponsafier 4. Vincent Heeringa had a chat with Rick Campbell and Steve Le Marquand, who tell us the secret to winning international work is wrack up the air miles and knock on the doors of the clients you’re after.
In what appears to be just a spooky coincidence an army of red shirts invade both the Warehouse and Vodafone ads, Pak’n’Save revisit 1987 and get stuck with Stick Astley, Daniel O’Donnell, Gin Wigmore and Florence and the Machine all sing for their supper and the latest in the TSB alien saga.
The dust has largely settled after the glorious Rugby World Cup shindig. But Heineken has kept up the momentum of the 46 percent increase in total sales it recorded in September/October when compared to the year prior after being awarded the Ad Impact Award for October for its new ad ‘The Entrance’, which was launched Super Bowl style at half-time during the final.
Every year, government agencies spend more than $60 million on the purchase of advertising and media services in New Zealand. There are already some fairly rigid structures in place to make sure public entities get the best partner for the best price. But, after 12 months work by a team of senior agency and government communications practitioners on establishing Government Best Practice Guidelines for Selecting Advertising and Media Agencies, CAANZ and the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet have come up with a few more.
The Aotearoa Film and Television Awards were dominated by tributes to the people of Christchurch, and honours were mostly split between the two major news networks TVNZ and TV3.
First there was award-winning copywriter Nigel Corbett. Then there was executive creative director Nigel Corbett. And now, having sold his shares in Auckland indie agency Sugar late last year, it’s now a case of roving creative director Nigel Corbett.
There have been a few changes in Colenso BBDO account set-up lately, with one big loss and a few smaller gains. And now it’s announced some changes to its senior staff line-up, with executive creative director Nick Worthington being promoted to the new role of creative chairman and long-standing creative director Steve Cochran, who has worked on much of Colenso BBDO’s award-winning work over the past 13 years, replacing him as executive creative director.
Hallensteins seems to be trying pretty hard to increase its coolness quotient. Publicis Mojo’s first ad for the mainstream clothes retailer featured a track by indie darlings Sleigh Bells (and they got in a bit of trouble for the racy lyrics) and to launch the summer 2011 range it has tapped into some Hollywood star power with the velvety voice of academy award nominee Matt Dillon and headed to Mexico City with Thick as Thieves to film the latest instalment of the Brothers campaign.
The Clemenger Group, New Zealand’s largest communications group, has bought Wellington-based digital activation agency, TOUCH/CAST. The deal gives Clemenger Group the majority stake in the business, while TOUCH/CAST retains a significant share.
…as the Craft Shop gets more animated, Promapp welcomes a new marketing manager, PR peeps get more cred, Y&R gets even more creative, Dialogue Partners is less Bland, and down south changes are a brewin’ at DB, and Southland Times’ new GM thanks Codd.
DesignCrowd launched on the New Zealand market a few weeks back and while not everyone might be a fan of crowdsourced design, the company certainly plans to stick around. Its presence in the Kiwi market and beyond has been given a booster by way of a $3 million investment from Australian VC firm Starfish Ventures. DesignCrowd chief executive Alec Lynch said the money would be used to enhance the company’s service in Australia, New Zealand and beyond. And after a chat on the phone, he was also quick to defend crowdsourcing, describing it as an “opportunity, not a threat” to existing design agencies.
Trouble’s a brewin’ in beersville with Monteith’s and Moa both claiming to be the first craft beer available duty free.
Procter & Gamble (P&G) will break a 26-year-long tradition when it begins its first ever New Zealand brand campaign on Sunday night. P&G owns supermarket brands such as Pantene, Duracell and Gillette but had, until now, deliberately remained in the shadows of its brands.
Amid all the global economic carnage, Deloitte Fast 50 was almost like an island of business optimism. Powershop took out the top-spot with the competition’s highest ever growth rate of 5280 percent, 2degrees was next on 3761 percent and many impressive smaller, often under-the-radar businesses from across the spectrum were recognised. But Special Group and The Research Agency stood out in the marcomms sector after being ranked as New Zealand’s 16th and 42nd fastest growing companies respectively.
With shareholders voting overwhelmingly in favour of splitting Telecom in two at the annual general meeting recently, the fall out from the “Abstain for the Game” campaign and the appointment of new marketing boss Jason Paris, change is most definitely in the wind for Telecom at the moment. And it’s thought the first phase of that change is cranking into gear.
Good Magazine’s December/January 2011 issue has beaten off fierce competition to be hailed as winner of The Maggies: Magazine Cover of the Year 2011. The cover features an image of a handmade pohutukawa wreath evoking the Kiwi Christmas spirit, and beat titles across all five categories, to be crowned overall Magazine Cover of the Year, as well as winning the Lifestyle category.
Westpac hasn’t been doing too shabby as of late. Last week it announced the New Zealand business has once again outperformed its Australian parent with a 41 percent boost in earnings. And perhaps proving that profitability doesn’t have to come at the expense of sustainability, Westpac also cleaned up at last night’s 2011 NZI National Sustainable Business Network. Westpac was named Sustainable Business of the Year and also took home the People’s Choice and the Trailblazer Large and Corporate Business awards.
They’re often seen as arch-rivals, but, in what appears to be a prime case of keeping your friends close and your enemies closer, TVNZ and Sky are thought to have snuggled up for a new digital TV product called Igloo that could be launched before the end of the year.
In a similar fashion to its NZ Pure billboard at the Auckland airport, Boundary Road Brewery and Barnes, Catmur & Friends’ have launched a cheeky new billboard for its new Lawn Ranger brew and referenced the recent spate of trademark bullying.
We knew it was going up for sale after a glittering career spent promoting the nation in some of the world’s busiest urban hubs. But we still had to laugh when we saw this unusual item come up on the government tender site last night. Only in New Zealand, you might say. Although it’s a shame it’s not on TradeMe. We think you creative types will be able to come up with a few interesting ideas for the next phase of the magnificent Giant Rugby Ball (imagine how impressed your clients would be if you had your Christmas party in this bad boy) and the best suggestion wins themselves a subscription to NZ Rugby World, some Cadbury chocolate and a new book by Jack Ralston and Steve Kilgallon The Sports Insider.
Love magazines? Love winning? The good folk at The Magazine Marketing Company are launching the Creative Magazine Guide and to celebrate they are giving away $3,000 worth of creative magazines.
The election isn’t dominating the ad breaks quite as much as rugby did last month – just some asset-kissing from the politicians in this latest round of Ads@6. “Vote National and kiss your assets goodbye,” says the Labour Party. Tony’s tires continue to grate, and that disaster prone Peter Elliot is back wondering whether your family would survive one.
Who’s it for: Mitre 10 Mega and Plunket by DraftFCB and Flying Fish
Why we like it: We’re suckers for time-lapse, especially when it’s used to promote a campaign helping to raise money for Plunket. A good idea, well-made and a nice original track from …
It’s been a tumultuous time for our Christchurch friends of late. But the team from UMC advertising is feeling pretty positive about the future after a surprisingly good year on the business front and a recent rebrand to Simpatico.
Tourism New Zealand has signed a $9 million marketing deal with Jetstar that will combine the airline’s low fares with the tourism organisation’s strong destination branding to encourage more international visitors from Australia, Singapore, Japan and across the Asia region.
The party may be over. But, as expected, there are plenty of sponsors trying to bask in the reflected glow of the All Blacks Rugby World Cup victory, including Adidas with its new ‘all ours, again’ spot.