As any good lifeguard will tell you, struggling against the rip is futile. Often the best approach is to go with the flow and embrace it instead. And DDB NZ has done just that with the surprisingly entertaining—and self-deprecating—contacts page on its new website.
3 News has already had a swipe at TVNZ’s poor coverage of the Christchurch and Japanese earthquakes with some comparative advertising earlier this year. And it’s keeping the pressure on the national broadcaster with a new campaign to promote the variety of news offerings available throughout the day.
Take a radio fashioned out of pavlova, some interactive nappy packaging, a 21st birthday party invite, mix it with a giant rubber duck and a home brewing system and what do you get? A snapshot of Kiwi creativity by way of the finalist entries for this year’s Best Awards, thanks to the folks at The Designer’s Institute of New Zealand.
Everyone who’s anyone in the research biz will be heading to Auckland’s Orakei Bay on September 2 to spread their gospel and/or expand their minds as part of the Market Research Society of New Zealand’s conference. And the organisers have zsushed proceedings up a bit this time round.
When it comes to misusing statistics, the media has been guilty of its fair share of whoppers. And the Stats Chat blog wants to hear some of your best examples for a new weekly competition.
Who’s it for: Royal New Zealand Air Force by Saatchi & Saatchi, Resn, Paragon Electronic Design and Kennedy Model Making.
Why we like it: We featured an ad that employed the services of miniatures in this section last week, but this week’s miniature thing has …
Life insurance is often seen as something of a morbid necessity and insurance companies often tap into the guilt factor to sell it. But Sovereign’s new campaign ‘Choose Life. Choose Sovereign’, which was developed by Whybin\TBWA and Tequila\ and continues a rebranding journey that began three years ago, aims to take a new, more positive stance on the role insurance plays in Kiwis’ lives with “a message of light-hearted empowerment”.
Last year, Wellington digital agency Heyday embarked on a big project to celebrate the 21st anniversary of the nation’s connection to the internet with www.downtothewire.co.nz. And the boffins are baying for blood after DraftFCB got its facts wrong for the latest Orcon campaign, which claims the internet arrived in New Zealand 18 years ago.
We love a good loophole here at StopPress. And despite the strict MEMA rules that aim to protect sponsors’ investments, there are still plenty of them available to savvy marketers hoping to make some hay while the Big Rugby Event shines. Official sponsor Heineken is already slightly aggrieved with Steinlager’s nostalgic white can campaign because of its focus on the tournament rather than the All Blacks and now Independent Liquor and Barnes, Catmur & Friends are getting in on the act with a cheeky billboard at the Auckland Airport.
It looked like the writing was on the wall for Publicis Mojo when DDB was given the big 2011 project for Steinlager and Shine was handed the Southern Finishing School work a few months back. And the relationship is now officially over, with DDB taking over all things Steinlager and Shine taking over all things Speight’s.
When Saatchi & Saatchi launched its ‘Get What It Takes’ campaign for the New Zealand Army in September last year, the campaign ended up becoming the most watched branded or sponsor channel on YouTube. Now Saatchi’s is at it again, this time with a unique, crafty and pretty entertaining interactive online game for the Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF).
The NAB Newspaper Ad of the Year awards have rolled around once again and, with the first Great Advertising Debate, advertising legend Neil French coming on board to help choose the big winner and a new digital category, it looks like it could be a good’un.
When co-founder and creative director of AmbientX Mark Pickering bought the company from Australian-owned Ambient Advertising Group, he announced he’d be re-branding the company to Fluxx and focusing on making it “the best agency in New Zealand dedicated specifically to experiential marketing”. But now it looks as if Pickering has another competitor in the Kiwi market, none other than Ambient Advertising itself. The company has decided it’s not quite ready to part with experiential and managing director of Ambient Advertising NZ Chris Monaghan has announced the launch of a new experiential and events arm of the agency.
Special Group took over Lion’s suite of Diageo products after it won a competitive pitch in June last year. But a decision to use more global creative for its Smirnoff brand means the local boys have been cut out the action for the time being.
Toyota’s leadership in making the environment a core management priority, while also engaging in a meaningful way with audiences around the world, has seen the company take out the top spot in Interbrand’s Best Global Green Brands 2011 report, which ranks the top 50 “green” brands with a global presence. But some of the very brands that ranked highly in environmental sustainability performance lagged behind when it came to public perception of their performance, suggesting many companies have a ways to go when it comes to communicating their corporate social responsibility efforts.
… as Colenso group account director Lou Kuegler heads for Asia, DraftFCB makes a surprising hire, Los Angeles calls for one of the Resn crew, Kiwi copywriter Cam Brown joins Arnold Furnace and Sunday Star Times reporter Jonathan Marshall leaves Fairfax.
Slacktivists the world over see Che Guevara as the personification of rebellion and often wear t-shirts to show just how rebellious they are. As such, he’s become something of an unlikely advertising icon, used to sell everything from lip balm to Smirnoff to mousepads. But local electricity retailer Powershop, fresh from a well-received satirical campaign featuring various dictators using their power differently, is up in arms after an Aussie energy drink company called Powerbeverage ripped off an online banner featuring the freedom fighter.
Print is often seen as the poor cousin of the media mix when it comes to creativity in advertising, especially when compared to some of the tricks now able to be performed in the online realm. But occasionally a publisher shows what can be done with good fashioned old paper and ink and NZ Rugby World has backed up its supreme accolades at the recent Magazine Awards with a very well-timed ‘barndoor’ cover on the August issue featuring our Dear Captain resplendent in Adidas’ new All Blacks jersey.
A gentle prod from CAANZ to remind all those clamouring for recognition in one of the most sought after awards of the year that the extended Effie deadline arrives on Monday 8 August. So you’ll have the whole weekend to sweat over your entry. Aren’t they kind.
Auckland mobile marketing company POCKETvouchers has a bit of a spring in its step after signing deals with global payment processor ePay and local daily deal site GrabOne recently. And chief executive Todd Wackrow says the new partnerships have streamlined the voucher process for marketers and allow the business to expand into other markets.
In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s 2011. 1987 was a while ago now. And while it must have been a very exciting time for Kiwis of yesteryear to win a Rugby World Cup, do we really have to point every element of tournament communication and design back to the glory days?
As it gets set to host the leather-clad man with the big voice and a penchant for very long songs, otherwise known as Meatloaf, the Bay of Plenty’s largest venue Baypark has unveiled a new branding effort that comes complete with a pun. The rebrand features a new and much more colourful logo carrying the new strap line: ‘Where there’s plenty going on’.
We could tell you about the e-gremlins that meant Fairfax failed to deliver some of its papers yesterday, or the bombshell that Tourism New Zealand’s PR company in the US helped get John Key on the David Letterman show. But we decided this supposed world-first from Wellington digital agency Resn, which brought a whole new, ridiculous and very interactive meaning to the term Twitterfeed, was much more important.
The chance to bathe in the Maggies limelight of award-wining cover design is quickly passing with entries closing this Friday 5 August. And, as long as you are in possession of a snazzy cover and can operate a mouse, entering is easy, “just choose a cover, tell us why, and press go”.
Rarely has a client portfolio switched back and forth like this one. After announcing only in March this year it was moving its portfolio from JWT to Ogilvy following a competitive pitch between the two agencies, Pharmacybrands has performed another switch. In a move based on recent strategic shifts combined with an internal review, the company has announced it’s reverting back to JWT.
Who’s it for: Sky by DDB and Prodigy
Why we like it: On first viewing, it seems like just another over earnest rugby ad. Turns out it’s one of the funniest instalments of the Match Fit series so far. Taking rugby advertising cliches and poking some …
The attraction of lower prices, convenience and broader product ranges is swelling the ranks of Kiwi consumers choosing to shop online, both locally and on international websites. And, according to a report on the Australian and New Zealand online shopping market published by PriceWaterhouseCoopers and Frost & Sullivan, almost half of the New Zealand population will do just that in 2011, with each shopper spending an average of almost $1,400.
Readers might not have been too complimentary when it came to the new packaging design for Bell Original tea, but the company’s marketing attempt to reach the kiddie demographic of tea drinkers has earned Auckland-based digital agency Method Studios a bunch of website-orientated global accolades.
The New Zealand office of Haystac opened for business in 2009 and two years on things are going rather swimmingly for the Aegis-owned PR agency, with TelstraClear, Jetstar, Sonos Electronics, Motorola and Next Generation Clubs recently joining SEEK, DB, GlaxoSmithKline, Mattel and Beehive and Premier bacon on its client list. They grow up so fast.
Ah, the food chain. It’s good to be on top. And .99’s creative interpretation of the marine pecking order in the ‘Predator and Prey’ Babushka doll print ad for Kelly Tarlton’s Underwater World has also come out on top in the July NAB Newspaper Advertisement of the Month, with Saatchi & Saatchi’s Women’s Refuge Trade Me ad receiving an Honourable Mention.