Great advertising is extremely challenging to create. An ad or promotion needs to do many things for it to stand out among the clutter of messages. They need to…
- Be Attention Getting
- Have a Clear, Memorable Message
- Be Brand Appropriate
- Be Locally/Audience Relevant, and as a bonus
- Be Remarkable
The team at Amsterdam-based UbachsWisbrun/JWT got their Christmastime Mini Cooper ads right. Brilliantly right.
Along with the rest of the Christmas trash pick-up – dotted around Amsterdam in the Netherlands – were large empty boxes with torn ribbons and wrapping paper. Apparently tossed by those who received new Mini Cooper cars for Christmas.
As you can see below, boxes were labeled with a line drawings of the car, minimal product information, and – whoops someone left on the price tag – ?99.00 per month. Almost looks like a box IKEA items are packed in.
But, of course, new Mini cars don’t arrive in a cardboard box. This was an ad. A brilliant ad. Mini Cooper has a history of clever, relevant ad messages. They promote the fun, style, and diminutive size of the Mini.
Let’s take a look at what makes this ad so great.
Attention Getting
Try NOT to see a box the size of a small car on the street corner. Especially one with bits of wrapping paper and broken ribbon. It’s not a bus or tram ad. It’s different.
Clear, Memorable Message
- The fact that a car can fit into a box that can be piled at the curb says “small.”
- The Mini box was piled with the rest of the Christmas packaging. Along with other toy packaging. (In the U.S. you’d see this stacked with boxes from red wagons, the Barbie Dream House, and new bikes). This ad reinforces the Mini as something fun – like a great toy.
- Additionally, the label on the box reads “99,- per maand” – translates to “99.00 per month.” I didn’t know they were that affordable.
Brand Appropriate
These ads hit on everything Mini. Small. Fun. Cool. Hip. Different. Clever. Not Too Serious.
Locally/Audience Relevant
“Someone lucky got a Mini for Christmas!” is immediate reaction. Seasonally relevant. While you don’t have to be from Amsterdam to appreciate these ads, living with the local trash pick-up system makes this ad that much more brilliant.
Most Amsterdammers don’t have cars to take large items to the dump. So, we can put nearly anything out to the curb for pick-up. From a broken TV to your old couch, special trash trucks arrive with cranes and scoop up large items. It is not unusual to see random household things on the curbs throughout the city. But a car-sized box? Wow! That makes this tactic that much more relevant.
Remarkable
This post is about garbage. A friend told me about it. Someone else posted about it. I’m telling you. Images can be found sprinkled across the internet. You’ll probably show or forward this to a co-worker or friend. You may even Tweet this article. Or re-tweet someone else’s tweet. That – my friend – is remarkable.
Take a look at the video, and the typical reaction. See the smiles, hear the chuckles. I garun-tee these people told others.
I’m disappointed I didn’t get to see this tactic personally right here in Amsterdam. John Moore from Brand Autopsy – 5,089 miles away in Austin, Texas – passed this on to me. Remarkable.
I spoke briefly with Lisa Merelle at UbachsWisbrun/JWT. She is the account manager for this campaign. She and the team are excited how people have reacted to the ads and the momentum it has on the internet. (Including this post!)
So, fellow marketers and business managers… it can be done! Let this example inspire you.
- Be Attention Getting
- Have a Clear, Memorable Message
- Be Brand Appropriate
- Be Locally/Audience Relevant, and…
- Be Remarkable
That’s the recipe.
What are your thoughts? Reactions?
UPDATE: Article Part Two: I was able to meet with the creative team and posed some of the questions we had for them: Exclusive Story: Behind The Mini Cooper Christmas Box Ads. Very interesting!
BONUS MATERIAL
Search Google Images for “mini ads” to see other Mini ad examples.
Thank you Ads Of The World for posting the images. Visit the link to see more images and names of the full team at UbachsWisbrun/JWT who worked on this project. More Mini Cooper ads at Marketallica site.
Absolutely, positively, brilliant! Totally unforgettable…
Steve,
Thanks for commenting. Have a great weekend.
Brillant but.. almost the same thing as the Tribeca one.
Shameless copycats (in this case I think Tribeca deserve a link in this post)or unfortunate coincidences?
Here is the link
http://www.marketing-alternatif.com/2008/12/02/mobizen-la-voiture-a-la-carte/
Nice weekend,
B.S. -
Very interesting. I had not seen that. Thank you for pointing it out.
There was some hubbub as there was a Heineken “big box in the trash” a week or two before the Mini version.
The Heineken looked like people had walk-in refrigerators delivered to their homes… similar to the kind featured in the recent commercial.
This link to the Creative Criminals site shows the execution:
http://creativecriminals.com/ambient/heineken-walk-in-fridge/
The folks who did the Mini project told me that they had no idea about Heineken and were waiting the 6-weeks for their boxes to be delivered when they saw the Heineken tactic.
The Mini execution was better and more relevant than Heineken.
Also, in looking at the TriBeCa’s execution of Mobizen, (which is a car share program)… The box represents the car that will soon be there for the public use. It looks like they also employed spokespeople to talk to those walking by about the program. (Maybe sign up?)
I think Mini did a better job in the execution of a ‘big empty box’ tactic. If it was a ’stolen’ idea – I think Mini took it to the next level.
I agree – VERY similar!
I’m hoping to meet with the folks who did the Mini project… I’ll find out if the Mobizen inspired them or if a coincidence.
Paul,
Thanks for your reply.
As you guessed it, I just wanted to point the similarity between the two ads.
About the execution, I can’t say better than you: “Brilliantly right”.
It really helps you illustrate how a great print campaign can do huge things for your internet presence. How much web exposure do you think Mini has gotten with this without having to write a single tweet, blog post, or metatag?
Great post Paul! I agree that this is exceptional in the way that they combine the factors of attention seeking, the 99 euro/month message, in a way that really matches the audience for the brand without diluting any individual component. A great execution of a smart concept.
My first reaction was “wow, I love this.” Then I thought about the resources to make and distribute these boxes – that they were basically produced to be “garbage,” and couldn’t help feeling a bit conflicted. It would be great to see some kind of further use for these boxes built into the plan…
Thanks so much for writing about this brilliant Mini Cooper campaign, Paul. Your discussion of what makes it great should be a must-read refresher for copywriters everywhere. We’ve got to deliver copy that’s just as pitch-perfect as these images. (And p.s. I do hope they recycle the boxes.)
Yes, the idea is creative, but it should have stopped right there.
This is totally irresponsible. Littering the streets is NOT good marketing, in my opinion.
Dan / Jesaka,
I thought about the boxes too from a “waste perspective.”
While I’m not a recycle expert… I think there were 12 executions… So 12 boxes. They boxes weren’t that thick… (i.e. not actually able to really contain anything).
Finally, they used brown paper cardboard – not chlorine bleached white paper. So that’s not as bad…
Speaking of white, bleached paper…
This seems less environmentally harmful than and a typical outdoor ad campaign which includes paper ads for buses, billboards, transit ads, etc. (and that is on bleached paper with colored inks).
Finally – even if the cardboard ended up NOT being recycled (which it all is in Amsterdam)… It would have been burned with the rest of our trash – and turned into steam powered electricity – which powers our tram system in Amsterdam.
(I wrote a piece on Daily Fix about the Amsterdam power plant- really cool).
As always – thank you for your comments… and for your detailed thinking!
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