The Campaign

We created a web movie with an allegorical story about Long Life Village, an imaginary village where the villagers are all long-living elderly people, symbolizing the current situation in Japan. The story gives viewers a fresh perspective that living long may not simply mean a good life.

Creative Execution

A hiker following an arduous trail finally arrives at a dreamy and secluded mountain village, Long Life Village, where the villagers enjoy long and peaceful lives. He is invited to stay with the head of the village and attempts to determine the secret to their longevity, but the man evades his question. He presumes it is due to the village lying amidst such beautiful and plentiful nature, but then he spies an open drawer in the next room filled with medicine. As he recalls memories of his day wandering the village he realizes the villagers were constantly referring to medicine. A graph illustrates data showing that although Japanese enjoy long lives often these are unhealthy years prolonged by medicine. In order to avoid over-reliance on medicine, ROHTO Pharmaceutical is taking concrete steps to promote healthy living via more than just medicine but also through healthy food and skincare.

The YouTube video had over 120k views, which was more than 10 times the number of views of the 2nd most viewed web advertisement that ROHTO Pharmaceutical was deploying at the time. The unexpected message from a pharmaceutical company gained a substantial response too, with positive feedback from many viewers posted on ROHTO's official Twitter account. As a result of this viewer response, we plan to develop a 2nd and 3rd wave of promotions.

In order to deliver a brand message that ROHTO is transforming from a company concerned simply with pharmaceutical products to a company engaging in all aspects of health, we chose to create a web movie content. That is an allegorical story about Long Life Village, an imaginary village where the villagers are all long-living elderly people, symbolizing the current situation in Japan. The story gives viewers a fresh perspective that living long may not simply mean a good life.

We analyzed the average life expectancy of Japanese people and determined the ratio of healthy years to unhealthy years. Our story builds on this data showing that while it is true that Japanese people live long lives, there are significant years of ill-health. By creating a message about health which is applicable to everyone, even those with no interest in pharmaceutical companies, we were able to deliver a brand message that ROHTO is transforming from a company concerned simply with pharmaceutical products to a company engaging in all aspects of health. We chose to create a web movie content in order to promote the phrase 'avoid over-reliance on medicine,' an impactful expression as a pharmaceutical company.