…as ACP backs up its recent restructure with a few promotions; Air New Zealand welcomes a new board member; 3d Interactive enlists the services of another human; and The Sweet Shop adds an awarded director to its global ranks.
As part of its Better Business, Better World study, Colmar Brunton probed over 2500 New Zealanders to see what they thought of—or knew about—sustainability. And when it comes to the brands Kiwis perceive as being the most sustainable, ecostore, Toyota, Meridian, Air New Zealand and The Body Shop were named as the top five.
As if Air New Zealand’s controversial spokesbeast Rico hasn’t had enough criticism directed at him, now he’s been accused of being a rip-off.
2010 was a pretty damn good year for Air New Zealand and, whether it was picking fights with magazines, dreaming up the next borderline marketing campaign or collecting one of its many prestigious awards, there was certainly never a dull moment. Having recently snapped up a sizable stake in Virgin Blue, won a Wallpaper Design Award for its snazzy premium economy spaceseats and, after more than four years of design and development, taken delivery of the first big Boeing bird to be fitted with the much-drooled over economy sky couch, dullness has been avoided at the start of 2011 as well. But what about that strange furry Count von Count-esque spokesbeast Rico, we hear you ask. Well, he has been busy travelling the world, offending and delighting in equal measure. And his latest polarising performance for Australia Day, once again created by .99, seems to have continued that trend.
Following the events of the past few years, most media have been busy licking their wounds—and, in many cases, focusing on survival rather than growth. But, after consistently good revenue results and signs that there is more growth to come, the Kiwi digital sector has developed quite the swagger. Liz Fraser, the chair of the Interactive Advertising Bureau of New Zealand and head of MSN NZ, opines.
It’s been fairly tough going for the out-of-homers over the past few years. But, with the numbers now going in the right direction, the Rugby World Cup expected to up demand substantially and OMANZ starting to regain its teeth, there seems to be a bit of optimism—and even industry cohesion—afoot. Adshel’s new sales director Nick Vile, who took over from Pauline Hanton late last year, speaks his piece.
Naked Communications is a force to be reckoned with overseas, but it’s only been on the local scene since late 2009. In that short time, it’s certainly had a big impact, taking a fair swag of strategy and channel planning work off some of its larger competitors and winning a couple of media award golds for its work with Diet Coke. Matt O’Sullivan, who left his posting at Carat to set up the Auckland office with Simon Bird, is one man who’s never short of opinions. So here are a few on 2010.
With the release of a very popular iPad app, some impressive print readership numbers, an excellent performance at the Qantas Media Awards and a good battle with Stuff for New Zealand’s online eyeball honours, APN shouldn’t be complaining too much over the Christmas break. Here’s what floated the boat of Donna O’Keeffe, advertising director at nzherald.co.nz
Instant Kiwi’s ‘Believe it or Not’ and Lotto’s ‘Lucky Dog’ (which is close to reaching the 500,000 views mark on YouTube) were two of the year’s favourite campaigns. And the Scratchy Bus was pretty damn cool too. Thanks DDB and Wendy Rayner, NZ Lotteries’ head of marketing.
Clare Morgan, the general manager of marketing at DB Breweries, has been busy ‘inspiring good times’ in 2010, presiding over a massive refresh of the DB Export family, the launch of a new ultra premium beer called Monteith’s Single Source and the efforts to leverage Heineken’s Rugby World Cup sponsorship. And here’s what piqued her interest in the world of marketing this year.
…Media Design School students win thing; a magical mystery store opens its doors in Auckland’s High St; The Documentary Channel is no more; social buying site GrabOne celebrates a milestone; the hunt is on for New Zealand’s Next Top Bookshelf; African adventurers and other charities look for assistance; Air New Zealand’s Christmas auction kicks off; ex-Fonterra boss Roger Boyd launches the ‘beverage of the well-travelled’; InComm arrives in Australasia; 2Degrees, now in 3Dimensions; NZ Post gives everyone a hurry up; and marvel at the glamour of the IAB/Facebook Xmas party.
McDonald’s New Zealand has made a key marketing appointment. And it’s a familiar face: ex-Air New Zealander Jules Lloyd, who recently left the airline after an eight year stint.
Let this raging torrent of information wash over you and be cleansed by tales of NZ Herald iPad upgrades, new Tiger beer websites, Air New Zealand’s new charity promotion, DraftFCB’s tremendous victory, creative bangers getting mashed in Make Something, Down to the Wire looking for your e-memories, Telecom’s new roaming offer, #Markchat delving into a debate about agency collaboration, DSA awards deadlines and someone slapping design in the face.
More stunning moves than Kasparov versus Deep Blue.
After purchasing the former Pinto plant in Tauranga, signing a big distribution deal in the UK and welcoming former Fisher Funds Management chief investment officer Warren Couillault into the shareholding fold this year, Kiwi-based VnC Cocktails is well and truly beefing up and planning on tripling its already impressive sales next year. And winning a highly competitive global tender to supply its premium pre-mixed cocktails to Etihad Airways’ First Class services is certainly a pretty good start.
There were over 1,000 entries from around the world, but there were just 16 golds awarded at the US Direct Marketing Association’s Echo awards and two of them went to New Zealand agencies, with .99 continuing its Midas touch with Air New Zealand’s ‘Nothing to Hide’ in the Consumer-Travel & Hospitality/Transportation section and RAPP Tribal winning for its ‘Thank You Notes’ campaign for Heinz Wattie’s Gourmet Dog in the Production Manufacturing and Distribution category.
First it was naked staff. Then it was naked old ladies. Then it was blow up dolls. And the latest campaign from Air New Zealand to promote its new 777-300 planes, which take flight later this year, is also a bit raunchy, featuring as it does a budding travel author/furry lothario called Rico who has an entertainingly poor grasp of English and a talent for unintentional innuendo.
BNZ’s GlobalPlus has, up until very recently, been the only credit card where users were able to earn Air New Zealand Air Points through their everyday purchases. But the airline decided to expand its credit card offerings in November, which means New Zealand Airpoints Members can now earn Airpoints Dollars with a few new banking providers. And what better way to show off this exciting evolution than with a sexy, slightly ridiculous romp around Auckland with a blow-up doll.
As Air New Zealand’s young, slightly more controversial upstart brand, grabaseat has always been given a bit more marketing rope than its parent. It’s certainly come up with some slightly unusual promotions in its time and it openly claims to do things in a way “that sometimes offends, sometimes makes you laugh, sometimes makes you cry and sometimes is just plain dumb”. But whatever grabaseat does, there’s always someone out there who will tell them how to do things better, apparently. So instead of fighting against the haters, it has decided to harness the creative power of the masses with the grabaseat billboard website.
Air New Zealand recently launched its new ‘Seats to Suit’ option for flights between New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific Islands, giving customers the opportunity to choose between four different ways of flying — Seat, Seat + Bag, The Works and Works Deluxe. And, in now fairly traditional Air New Zealand/.99 style, it’s created a quirky piece of promotional content to highlight the different options.
The sixth biennial Market Research Effectiveness Awards were held at Auckland’s Hilton Hotel on Friday. And with not a pie chart, pocket protector or sellotaped pair of glasses in sight, the science boffins of the marketing world converged with their clients to prove just how effective good market research can be in driving business and marketing success.
Pull up an ear as we attempt to make all your marketing dreams come true with news of account wins, new hires, newish agencies, old departures, big rebrands, Taika Waititi, Air New Zealand, wallpaper, beer and giant balls.
Air New Zealand and Fly Buys have snuggled up together with a new mutually beneficial partnership that creates a range of benefits for members of both the Air New Zealand Airpoints programme and Fly Buys loyalty programme, which together adds up well over half of the country’s population.
Given the fact that well over six million humans watched Air New Zealand’s ‘The Bare Essentials of Safety’ video on YouTube, it was always going to be a tough act to follow. But the new safety video, which launched today on its branded YouTube channel and aims to show how crazy the airline is about rugby in the lead-up to next year’s Rugby World Cup, certainly doesn’t seem to be suffering from second album syndrome.
Air New Zealand already has plenty of customer loyalty, but plenty obviously isn’t enough, because the national carrier has come up with another way to inspire brand allegiance after it jumped on the location-based social media bandwagon and opened its Foursquare account.
The newspapers were the real winners of the May edition of the Newspaper Advertising Bureau’s (NAB) Ad of the Month competition after Air New Zealand’s chief executive Rob Fyfe, with the help of its agency .99, decided to take his grievances with the Listener public by producing a video and running a few full page print ads. And it just kept getting better for the papers when the Listener decided to follow suit, continuing the stoush with a few full-pagers of its own.
Air New Zealand has continued its purple patch, picking up a few more global industry accolades over the weekend after being chosen as Best Airline Australia/Pacific and handed the Staff Service Excellence Award for the Australia/Pacific region at the Skytrax World Airline Awards, a ‘passenger’s choice’ style awards for airlines.
In this week’s instalment of Wammo Pound and Mash, come with us on a spiritual journey as we delve into the murky yet increasingly popular realm of experiential advertising.
Greedy old Air New Zealand has scooped another Best Airline award, this time at the 2010 Which? Awards.
It’s news Stinky Jim, but maybe not quite as you know it.