NEW ZEALAND MEETS JAPAN

Short List
TitleNEW ZEALAND MEETS JAPAN
BrandLION
Product / ServiceTOKYO DRY
CategoryD01. Social Video
EntrantDDB NEW ZEALAND Auckland, NEW ZEALAND
Idea Creation DDB NEW ZEALAND Auckland, NEW ZEALAND
Media Placement ZENITH Auckland, NEW ZEALAND
PR THE PR SHOP Grey Lynn, NEW ZEALAND
Production GOODOIL FILMS Auckland, NEW ZEALAND
Additional Company LION Auckland, NEW ZEALAND

Credits

Name Company Position
Damon Stapleton DDB Group New Zealand Regional Chief Creative Officer
Shane Bradnick DDB Group New Zealand Executive Creative Director
James Conner DDB Group New Zealand Creative Director
Christie Cooper DDB Group New Zealand Creative Director
Jenny Travers DDB Group New Zealand Business Partner
Michael Doolan DDB Group New Zealand Senior Business Manager
Judy Thompson DDB Group New Zealand Executive Producer
Samantha Royal DDB Group New Zealand Senior TV Producer
Lucinda Sherborne DDB Group New Zealand Executive Planning Director
Mark Foster Goodoil Executive Producer
George Mackenzie Goodoil Business Director
Joe Kefali Goodoil Director
Andrew Mclean Goodoil Producer
Peter Grasse Mr Positive Line Producer
Germain McMicking Goodoil DOP Lighting Cameraman
Mark Burnett The Editors Offline Editor
Dave Gibson Goodoil Colourist
Stu Bedford The Machine Room Online
Jonathan Mihaljevich Franklin Road Music Licensing
Cam Ballantyne Beatworms Music Arranger/Producer

Background

Steinlager is New Zealand's national beer. But they were seeing a worrying trend emerge as Kiwis in their 20s moved away from traditional NZ brands. For these young Kiwis, the classic, iconic Steinlager was a little bit old fashioned and uncool. With a quarter of the population living overseas and immigrants now making up another quarter of our demographic, NZ culture has changed. More and more, young Kiwis were looking overseas for inspiration and rejecting anything that represents 'old New Zealand' as they strive to appear more worldly. It was from this insight that Steinlager Tokyo Dry was born. A beer made from NZ ingredients and Japanese brewing mastery. Steinlager wanted to advertise this Japanese inspired beer without losing their NZ heritage, So we followed the format of Tokyo Dry by taking another iconic New Zealand classic and remaking it with Japanese masters of a different kind.

Describe the creative idea

Music is intrinsically linked to a country's national identity and nothing goes with beer more than a great song. So, what could be a better way to advertise a beer that combines two different cultures, than with music that does the same? We took an iconic New Zealand song, 'Slice of Heaven' by Dave Dobbyn and Herbs, and remade it in Japan. Pegged as NZs unofficial National Anthem, it's a song that every Kiwi knows and loves. Now, more than 20 years after it first appeared in the charts it was perfectly poised for an update. This film was the outcome, a music video, released on social and featuring a whole range of Japanese musicians from J-pop singers to Taiko drummers, each of whom put their own spin on the song. Making a fresher take on an old Kiwi classic, just like Steinlager did when they made Tokyo Dry.

Describe the strategy

We needed to reach savvy young New Zealanders who rejected anything that looked like traditional advertising. So we treated our campaign like any other song release. This social video is a cutdown of the music video and was used to launch the song (and the campaign). Our social video strategy was divided into three tiers: • Cultural Depth Charge (Reach & Awareness) Launch the music video to drive brand awareness to a wider audience cross-platform • Cultural Conversations (Native Engagement) Stimulate the excited, perhaps controversial buzz and watercooler chat of the new okyo Dry film and showcase the Dave Dobbyn’s emotional reaction • Cultural Involvement (Social Participation) Drive engagement and participation through social channels to get the nation singing along. Data Tactics: Launch week; targeting 18+ kiwis reading news content first thing Monday morning and build on efficient targeting through lookalike audiences who engaged with previous Steinlager video content.

Describe the execution

The night before the launch, the countries most watched news show - Seven Sharp, played an exclusive first look at the music video. Then the next morning our biggest Newspaper, The NZ Herald ran a story about the song and shared the music video online as well on their social pages. Throughout the day radio DJs played and talked about the song and video and Dave Dobbyn (the original singer and NZ's most famous musician) shared a video to his social pages of the first time he watched it, prooving we had his blessing and approval. Over the next few days, all the Japanese musicians and the countries most popular radio stations also shared the video on their social pages while Dave Dobbyn took part in several radio interviews. The song was also released on Spotify and iTunes and was accompanied by street posters, merchandise giveaways on social.

List the results

Business Results Sales went up 44% in volume and 28% in value. Not only is the brand increasing penetration, it continues to bring new drinkers into the category. Communications Results Our version of ‘slice of heaven’ has earnt its own place in New Zealand culture. The whole campaign gained a reach of 4,915,813 (and New Zealand has a population of only 4.8 million). Online video results 472,229 Film Video completions (+77% exceeded delivery against benchmarks) 1,720,538 unique kiwis 18+ 557,479 engagements with social content with 602 shares

Links

Video URL