We aren't normally a fan of iconic brands drastically changing their image, logo, tagline and overall marketing but we've taken a quick look at the new Absolut campaign from TBWA/Chiat/Day New York and we like it. We really like it. Gone is the bottle, mostly, and gone is the print heavy focus. TV has been added to the mix showing iconic imagery such as an image of Steve McQueen with the tagline, "The Absolute Man," an image of the Statue of Liberty with the tagline, "The Absolute Welcome" and an image of the moon rover with the tagline, 'The Absolute Road Trip." Clearly, the over crowded, hipsteresque vodka landscape has required a different tact for Absolut to set itself apart. This just might work.
Woe was Donny this past Summer with account losses from Monster, Old Navy, and Revlon not to mention that Speedo picture but things are looking up for his agency Deutsch which, today, was awarded with the return of its former $60 million client IKEA. Most recently, IKEA was with Secret Weapon and has returned to Deutsch without a review. Welcome back, Donny.
In a perfect alignment, Budweiser has signed on as exclusive promotional sponsor of Sports Illustrated's Swimsuit issue and will also team with SI supermodel Molly Sims who will appear in the brewer's point of sale material. Budweiser will host pre-issue promotional parties in 50 cities on February 13. Budweiser will also place a six-page fold out in the issue featuring FOX Sports Best Damn Sports Show Period hottie Leann Tweeden.
To appeal to men, many soft drink makers have dropped the word "diet" from the name of their products or introduced newly named products. In Coke's case, there's Coke Zero. A clandestine element of the campaign urging men to consume Coke Zero is a weblog, with no mention of Coke's involvement (Note: apparently in reaction to negativity about this effort, the page is now clearly branded with a Coke Zero bottle), named The Zero Movement on which a guy rants about why life is so full of stuff to do and how it would be so much nicer if there was, well, zero to do. It's written in typical character blog prose, devoid of personality and full of whiny banter which comes off like it's a product of a creative brief. There's even fake, supportive comments to go along with it.
While the blog's archives indicate the site's been up since June, 2005, Whois information tells a very different story. Not only does the information reveal the site is a product of Coke, it clearly states the domain for the site was registered November 21, 2005, a full five months after the site, according to its archives, launched. On top of this, blog monitoring service BlogPulse has little to no information on the blog. Had The Zero Movement blog been pumping out posts since June 2005, BlogPulse would have had a sizeable profile for the site. Blog search engine Technorati, aside from some recent referrals, doesn't have much either. In creating The Zero Movement, Coke has lied, misled and misrepresented. Some would call this reprehensible and irresponsible. We'll just call it stupid.
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Jason Kottke, New York blogger extraordinaire, purchased a new Apple Powerbook three weeks ago and,according to Kottke, three weeks too soon. When he watched Steve Jobs reveal the new MacBook at CES MacWorld last week, tears rolled down his eyes, onto the keyboard of his Powerbook as he wrote Apple a disheartening letter wondering, humorously, if his Powerbook, victim of his grief, was covered under warranty.
Thanks to Hurt Elbow, we now have visual proof the new Intel logo leaps ahead of nothing and simply joins the "logo ovalation" crowd. Check out all the unoriginal, copy-cat insanity here in one gigantic, orgasmic ovalistic circular logo-fest that either proves originality is dead or that all these brands used the same focus group.
On the heels of Intel's logo change comes another from Kodak. After 35 years, the photography giant introduced a new logo at the Consumer electronics Show in Las Vegas Friday. The new logo does away with the graphic Kmart-like K graphic and shifts to simply the word Kodak in a new typeface with horizontal bars above and below. It's cleaner looking but the company has some great equity in the old look. We're leaning towards the "we like the old better than the new" end of the spectrum. What are your thoughts?
Surely, you've already seen the new AT&T/SBC campaign at least 300 times on TV. You know, it's the one in which the world looks like it's being attacked by two luminous alien vehicles. Well, that campaign, with $500 million behind it, is about to take over the Internet. AT&T isn't saying what percent of the $500 million will be allocated to the Internet but, beginning Monday, January 9, they do plan to reach 137.8 million unique monthly user, nearly half of everyone who goes online in a given month. So be prepared for banners, banners and more banners everywhere along with page takeovers, interstitials, sliders, dog ears, video ad units and all manner of online creative. We wonder if they've heard of these things called blogs. Apparently, they have.
Created by Goodby-Silverstein and GREY Direct, Adobe will, on January 9, launch a new online campaign called "Faces of InDesign" to promote the company's Creative Suite 2 which launched earlier this year with the tagline, "Everything but the idea." The campaign will feature the images and personal stories of designers, art directors and ad execs as they go through their day using Adobe products. One of the creative elements in the campaign can be seen here.
Nabbing $4 million for her efforts, actress Scarlett Johansson will appear in L'Oreal's celebrity-focused ad campaign joining Eva Longoria, Mila Jovovich Andie MacDowell and Beyonce Knowles. Johansson's previous celebu-campaign appearances include Calvin Klein and Louis Vuitton. Reportedly, Johansson will appear in ads displaying a range of L'Oreal-enhanced hair colors.
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