Nike, Art and the London Marathon

British illustrator James Jarvis has teamed up with Nike to create a short animation entitled "Onwards". The rumour is that James Jarvis will be running the London Marathon this weekend in a specially designed yellow suit built for him by Nike. That sort of knowledge is exactly the right sort of in-depth engagement that fans can talk about (if it is indeed true!). The project was proposed and produced by Jarvis with the end result being, what he hopes, "a much more equal collaboration with a brand". This is a rare example of a company supporting an artist without overbranding their work and taking away it's independent feel - the only references to Nike are small credits at the beginning and end of the animation where they are thanked for their support.


Onwards from akqa on Vimeo.



Thanks for this spot Chris.

More sensory branding

Another great example of sensory branding, this time from Roche - the world's largest cancer-treating drug company - and McCann Erickson Portugal.

Breast cancer is the cancer with the highest incidence in Portugal. 4,500 new cases are detected annually and the death rate is one of the highest in Europe. The marketing challenge was to "create a simple, low-cost action that would raise awareness of the importance of self-examination".

The innovative solution was to distribute 50,000 stress balls with a stone inside, designed to simulate a lump. Each ball featured the tagline: "You don't see breast cancer. You feel it. Do the self-exam.", and was accompanied by a 'how to self-examine' leaflet.


The balls were distrubuted to women on the street, in the workplace, in hospitals and at theme-related events. And the results? A 22% increase in mammograms and a 28% increase in hospital visits.

Innocent loses its halo

So the touchy-feely, fluffy-wuffy founders of Innocent "Dwinks" have sold a 20% stake to Coca-Cola and the consumer backlash has begun:

I feel more cheated and duped by this than the bankers. At least Fred Goodwin is honest enough to admit his love of money. At least you know where

you stand with 'hard' capitalism.

It would appear that doing business in "a more enlightened way" means continually lecturing your consumers as to your general ethics and worthiness, before completely selling out to a multinational at the first opportunity [cf Pret].

And our favourite?

I love the comment above: "You can kiss goodbye to this customer". Yeah? Right on. I bet you liked the ad where it showed some 'gwapes' and had the caption "We cwush these" and then a sepia picture of photogenic poor Cuban farmers by a cool 1950s Chevvy truck "But we don't cwush any of these". Anyone - ANYONE - who is not repulsed by that kind of bullshit deserves to be drowned in a bath of Coke and have their head held under by a Niked boot while Coldplay rings out. Good luck to the founders. Cash it in. You won't see me at Fruitstock because I don't purchase my lifestyle. Grow up and Enjoy Coca-Cola.

We say either sell out or don't sell out - there's no half way. Innocent's founders have protested that they were never "anti-big business". Well, their marketing strategy begs to differ. They founded a very successful business on ethical principles and marketed themselves ruthlessly on the back of said principles. By getting into bed with Coke, they can no longer credibly market themselves in this way. We await their next move with interest.

Anything you can do, I can do better

We love this example of how BMW has beaten Audi at its own game (of chess).

Audi laid down the gauntlet with its "Your move, BMW" tagline and this is how the local BMW dealership responded...


As an aside, it's nice to see brands getting competitive with their media as well as their creative. Well played, BMW.

Smoke and Mirrors and Rice Krispies

In a strange case of ‘now you don’t see it…now you do’ branded packets of cereal could soon be appearing in the kitchen of the Big Brother house in the UK as part of a plan from Endemol to insert product placement into catch-up content that is viewed online.

The super-indie has signed a deal with MirriAd, which specialises in digitally inserting CGI overlays into film to look like they were part of the original footage.

The technology will allow the indie to generate revenue by embedding branded props, signs, logos, videos or animations into the likes of Deal or No Deal or Coleen's Real Women when they appear on commercial catch-up content websites.

Product placement is banned in programmes produced for UK -television but there are no restrictions on embedding advertising in online content.

Can’t wait to see cupboards full of ‘pukka’ Baxters Soup in Jamie’s Kitchen or Catherine Morland munching on a ‘Sub of the Day’ in catch-up versions of ‘Northanger Abbey.’

Mojo goes from 'dad rock' to 'rock garden'

This month's Mojo comes complete with a 15% off Homebase voucher.

It might perform well against Homebase's target audience, but surely his favourite music magazine is the last place a fortysomething wants to be nagged about DIY chores.

Has Mojo lost its mojo or is this proof that media planning by numbers alone just doesn't work?

Thanks to popbitch for the tip off.

The smell of summer

It seems very apt that we've come across this little gem on what might be Scotland's first (and probably last) day of summer.




It really does beg the question: why is 80% of all brand communication audio or visual?

Exit polls showed a 515% higher rate of recall versus the same ad shown without the scent. Pretty impressive results, especially with ad recall at an all-time low.

Sensory branding has been around for a while, but it's never really taken off in a big way. We only have two eyes and two ears, but we have ten fingers and toes and over 2,000 tastebuds - maybe it's time we started acting like it?

PS Thanks to psfk.com's Media Arts Mondays for the tip off.