Ooh…. a new Speights TV ad. How interesting…
February 14 2006, 5:28 pm | | 37 Comments
Speights. Pride of the South ( and Saatchi and MTC since about 1990). Now camping out under the stars at Mojo/Publicis.
This is the first work from them for this iconic beer brand. And perhaps for Lion itself. It’s not a brand ad as such, but a promo for the Super 14. So, what have they done? Does it signal a change of direction?
Have we seen the last of the two gay guys in the oilskins?
Apparently this spot went to air at the weekend but nzcc were out drinking champagne from a trannie’s shoe and missed it. See it here, like we did this afternoon:
http://www.beam.tv/beamreels/beamreel.php?twRxgWFTKy
What do you think? Please discuss.
37 Comments
Really old hat.Everyone groaned in my house when they saw it. It’s not a new idea, how many times have we seen that idea executed before? No, try agian. Failure.
If this was 2002-2003 you could bung a DB Draught logo on the end and it would be bang on brief for their strategy too.Also the helicopter noise is wrong for that type of chopper. Again 🙂
But nicely shot, Nic and team.
It’s got everything to do with the south island and nothing to do with New Zealand rugby. I’ve taken the liberty of doing an Auckland Lager ad.Set to the soothing sounds of The Bleeders.Cut to some gay as guys mincing it up hardcore in the Les Mills changing rooms.Super – Our GymCut to a guy walking down K Road at 6am on Sunday, he chewing his face off and has obviously been on the pipe. Super – Our ports nutrition.We open on a bunch of South Auckland guys laying into a rough patched guy lying on the ground behind a public toilet block/changing room in a suburban park.Super – Our trength conditioning.Cut to some guys walking down Queen Street dodging the 5.30 crowds without getting kebab juice on their shirts.Super – Our agility training.Cut to a beautiful woman walking down Ponsonby road. As guy walks past her he swings around and takes a look at her arse, slamming backwards into a guy walking past.Super – Our tackling training.Cut to a really pissed guy trying to get to the bar to order a drink in a fuckin packed Viaduct bar. Super – Our scrum machine.Cut to a slightly damaged but beautiful stucco wall Presented with indifference AUCKLAND LAGERMONETARY SPONSORS OF THE SUPER 14cut
Add a guy carying a fat drunk North Shore lass over his shoulder up North Head and it’s good to go to client.
Add logo
Shits on Export.
Please, no scat.Heidi
one is refreshing, one goes down a worn old south island dusty trail.
No, both are tired.I have to apologise to my mates on behalf of the advertising industry every time the Export ad comes on.
I hate having to do that…The worst is when a shite ad comes on and someone in the room pipes up “Is that one of yours?” with a sarcastic smirk on their face.ps. what the fuck is an ’emergency shrivel situation’pps. the speights ad makes me cum in my moleskins everytime I see it
Beautifully executed.Though, the trick of showing something, and calling it something else- isn’t it a little hack?David Bell taught us it was a well trodden path. But i’m just a student.-Axis Student ’05
looks great, idea is nothing special but fuck it’s a lion beer brand, tough crowd to get anything decent thru. when will lion stop taking themselves so seriously, it’s no surprise that Tui is killing them in sales.
Bring back the two gay guys in oilskins.This ad is a feed of arse. They’ve abandoned the tone of voice that set Speights apart from other beers for the desperate cliche-ism of Lion Red. A first-thought idea that should only ever have been presented to the bin.
I agree… bring back the Brokeback Mountain guys.I wonder if whoever wrote this new ad had ever seen the waikato draught billboards…
They’re fucking horrible too.
I’m sure the guys at Lion and the entire population of Gore are very happy with it.
Hey Axis Student 05. I am sure Mr Bell also told you that you can throw out everything you know once you get in the industry because it’s a whole different ball game. I bet the team knew it was not an original idea, they were trying to get something thru that the client would actually sign off. The fact that it is executed brilliantly shows that these guys know what they are doing. Better then 99% of other ads out there. So why don’t you get off the blog and get stuck into that point of sale brief you’ve been given.
And you can get back to that Lion Red brief that’s sitting on your desk
The fact it’s brilliantly executed is more likely to show these guys knew it was an weak idea.The “just trying to get something through” defence is ridiculous. The client signed off the gay cowboy campaign and that was good. Your argument might hold water if it was a Noel Leeming ad but definitely not Speights.I’d say AXIS student 05 could’ve beaten it easily if the brief wasn’t hogged by patch-protecting seniors like you.Might want to brush up on those Point of sale skills yourself.
Just trying to get something through? Fuck right off.
Nah, beer is hard. Especially the approval process(es).As for the ditching of Steptoe and Son, I quite likes the dream sequence Speights ad. It was good to see the old fella acting outside of his usual character (apart from on the Westie show, I never watched that, was always busy tending to the vege patch or listening to the neighbours having another domestic).Ahh well, back to another rural press black and white classified section 10×2.
True, beer is hard.But, even still, they still came up short… especially for a brand with a history of great ads.
You lot are so cool. I love you all :)Love Leighton Dyer
Who are you?
He’s a mac operator.
Lee T is a mac operator as well !!
You are all so constructive.If you were really a reliable judge on this matter you would put names to your comments.
Believe me, I am a judge in the matter. The Speights ad is cringe-fest.Nic F did a great job directing it. Although I do have to take issue with him using up a too much water on the terrible ‘scrum practice’ section. Down in the central basin things get a bit dry about this time of the year. Such indecriminate use of water is probably one of the reasons why that silly projects like Project Aqua is still on the table. While they filmed the scene, a little farmlet runs dry.There you go, more in-depth knowlege of South Island issues than that North Island Speights ad could ever hope to.
Awwww come on that was real rain.
dubsie, If we had to put our names to our comments we’d be much less inclined to be honest. None these comments seem overly bitchy from here.if an ad’s a shitter what’s wrong with saying so?
Leighton Says “who am I? I’m the person who puts his name up when i post” who the hell are you? And i’m an art director.. and i do love you all still.. you’re totes awse..”
Well yeah maybe. But I still think it is better then most. The direction is nice as. The music – graceful. And the idea is not really that bad. Beats the fuck out of that Heineken catastrophe or any other beer ad. I think it is just a truism that coming up with fresh thinking is one thing but getting it past the bullshit is another. We all shouldn’t be to quick to judge.What…like you all haven’t had an ad pecked to death by ducks lately?
I hope you’re not calling this ‘fresh thinking’…
Not much choice, given that the wannabe NZ-male target audience is so stale.Just show boys poking borax at normal civilised behaviour and you’ve got the only other kind of beer ad that seems to work in NZ. Makes you want to get really drunk.Speaking of which, has anyone seen that article on the company that marketed absinthe as a date-rape drug?
It looks real bad when Mojo guys hop on the blog to defend heir ads… real bad.But beer IS hard. The client just wants big fuck-off shots of beer being poured into chilled glasses. They have this in mind whenever they write a brief. But still, it’s much better than say a bank.I reckon throw the BK apes in there and it’d be a cracker!
I think I’d prefer shots of beer being poured into chilled glasses to an overproduced ad using a tired creative technique to illustrate a poor understanding of both rugby and Speights drinkers