UFO Rodeo has acquired leading Wellington production company Wrestler, marking a major step in its national expansion.

After nearly two decades of pushing boundaries in advertising and entertainment, the team behind Augusto Group is taking on a new identity: UFO Rodeo.

Augusto has stepped into the political fray, helping Labour to pull together a TV ad featuring new party leader Jacinda Ardern.

Wendy’s and Augusto are getting real about bacon addiction in a new camping to promote the new range of Baconator burgers.

Round of applause to Adidas Rugby, Mazda and BurgerFuel.

Later this year, New Zealand will host some of the world’s golfing superstars during the Mckayson New Zealand Women’s Open. And to build the hype, sports marketing agency The Clubhouse and Augusto turned Auckland backyards into a green for Lydia Ko.

Augusto has just added Discovery’s Everest Rescue Series to its growing portfolio of global TV series and documentaries. We chat to agency’s general manager Oliver Sealy and executive producer Cass Avery about the arduous journey it took to get this thing off the ground.

With the appointment of Angus McNab as new chief strategy and international officer, Augusto has signalled its intent to move beyond local borders. We chat to the new recruit, managing director Michelle Walshe and general manager Oliver Sealy about exploring new frontiers.

Following the sneak peak earlier this week, today Adidas revealed the new All Blacks’ jersey with a Facebook video by August that racked up hundreds of likes in the first half an hour. And while the jumper stands to improve the players’ game, what generates all the hype for fans? The All Blacks’ success and a sci-fi video appear to have done the trick.

Earlier this month, a young Auckland professional made headlines for using Facebook to try and land his dream job. Edward McKnight used ads on the social media site to target ASB staff as a way of applying for the role of youth and innovation sponsorship manager at the bank. And while McKnight has yet to be offered a job at ASB, it’s a sign that the traditional recruitment process of sending in a CV and crossing your fingers may be in need of a shake-up. Hoping to do just that is the new recruitment platform PreviewMe. Set to have its beta version go live early next month, the website hopes to reduce the pain points of both candidates and employers by introducing video to the recruitment process.

TV has had a rough time of it recently, with declining audience figures causing some to consider it dead. Now Mitre 10 has made a play to take advantage of the shifting audience, by creating its own On Demand video streaming channel, via Augusto, servicing DIY spirited Kiwis with a host of original home improvement themed content.

Wendy’s has launched a TVC to promote its new pulled beef range. The spot, via its new agency Augusto, features team members of the Vodafone Warriors taste-testing the range and getting covered in its saucy fillings in the process.

The traditional perception of golf usually evokes images of diamond-patterned shirts, cheese cutters, pastel sweaters, loafers and affluent white men. This long-standing myth is so entrenched that it even led to the urban myth that the word golf was in fact an acronym for ‘gentleman only, ladies forbidden’. This, of course, isn’t true, but the stereotype has long prevailed in golfing, leading to it being seen as a rich man’s sport or a hobby for retirees.

360-degree video, which has been described as the next big thing in tech for 2016, is slowly gaining traction in New Zealand as brands begin experimenting with it in creative ways. Here’s a rundown of how a few of them have been using it so far. PLUS: a first-hand account of Augusto’s experience with the technology.

V has jumped on the 360-degree video bandwagon and created one of its own in a promotional video featuring drifter Cole Armstrong via Augusto.

Late last week Cure Kids’ campaign consisting of a video clip for a song, dubbed Team, Ball, Player, Thing as a fight against Batten disease and a Rugby World Cup sendoff featuring, well, pretty much every New Zealand celebrity blew up, with news of the clip dotted all over the internet. Cure Kids and Augusto worked tirelessly on the campaign and faced some big challenges (like not having all of the featured celebs in the same room when filming, for instance). Here’s a look behind the scenes to see how this enormous project came together.

In continuation of its ‘Imagine’ campaign online, Lotto Powerball enlisted the help of a hypnotist to trick a few Kiwi celebs into thinking they’d won the big one, then asked them what they would do with the money.

The All Blacks brand has become a huge commercial force in recent years and the players are regularly wheeled out to participate in campaigns for New Zealand Rugby’s sponsors. While there a whole host of fairly strict rules around those appearances, those campaigns still have an agenda attached. And while we’ve seen work like Telecom/Spark’s Backing Black or, further back in time, Steinlager’s Stand by Me aiming to galvanise fan support around the team, New Zealand Rugby hasn’t done a campaign for themselves (aside from a few Super Rugby efforts). But as the All Blacks prepare to defend the Rugby World Cup, that’s changed with ‘Belong’, an initiative aimed at getting fans to show their love for the team and join the “online clubroom” Team All Blacks.

Adidas has released a new TVC by Augusto promoting its new campaign ‘Force of Black’ featuring some fierce footage of our boys in black.

Adidas has released a new global campaign about seizing the moment, which features some of the world’s top athletes, including All Blacks Richie McCaw and Sonny Bill Williams. The campaign features 30-second TVCs of top athletes from around the world who are at the top of their game in their respective sports, delivering short monologues about why they “take today”.