"Beats of the Beautiful Game," curated by Pepsi, will be released June 10 ahead of the World Cup
Pepsi is pairing singers and filmmakers to release a visual album that celebrates soccer during the World Cup.
Spike Lee, Timbaland, Idris Elba and Kelly Rowland are some of the artists whose work is featured on the Pepsi-curated album, "Beats of the Beautiful Game," to be released June 10. The soda company announced Monday its album will be a collection of 11 anthem-like songs and short films.
"What I love about this is how creative it is," said Rowland, whose song "The Game" will have a video directed by Lee. "It's a project with a whole bunch of different artists being able to do different songs. I'm excited about being a part of something like this."
The Janelle Monae track, "Heroes," was the first single to debut in April. The album will be released through Capitol Music Group's independent label, Caroline.
Each week, a new track and short film will be released from the album starting May 20.
Pepsi is looking to gain global attention in a battle with Coca-Cola, which is the main sponsor for the World Cup that kicks off June 12 in Brazil. The launch of the visual album is another attempt to build its brand with major figures without mentioning the event, which occurs every four years.
"To be honest, it'll be a great marketing tool for Pepsi," Lee said. "There's no reason I'd try to deny that."
Pepsi recently began a campaign that included soccer's top stars such as Argentine forward Lionel Messi, English midfielder Jack Wilshere, Spanish defender Sergio Ramos and Belgian defender Vincent Kompany.
The new album also features rising British singer Rita Ora and Elba will direct a video for the song "Unstoppable" from the DJ-producer R3hab and singer Eva Simons, both Dutch-based acts.
The performers are not expected to appear in the short films, but Lee, - who is filming in Brazil - promises to include Rowland somehow.
"I love the idea, but I got to sneak a picture in there somewhere," the director said with a chuckle. "Somewhere she has to appear. She'll be lip syncing, but she'll be in there. I promise you."
-- James joins Sprite to select $50,000 grand-prize winner
-- Four finalists to receive exclusive learning experience tailored to their
field
ATLANTA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 14, 2014--
For over a decade, LeBron James has made a massive impact on the basketball court, and this summer, he is partnering with Sprite to change the game off the court for four deserving fans.
Sprite and LeBron James #ChangeTheGame again! (Photo: Business Wire)
Through the Sprite(R) 6 Mix(TM) by LeBron James #ChangeTheGame contest, Sprite will award an aspiring musician, a visual artist, an entrepreneur and a civic leader with a tailor-made educational experience. James will select one game-changer to receive a $50,000 grand prize. The contest is a celebration of the launch of Sprite(R) 6 Mix(TM) by LeBron James, a limited-edition flavor of Sprite created in partnership with the superstar. Sprite 6 Mix is available nationwide in convenience retail stores.
People ages 18 - 30 who are changing the game through music, visual arts, entrepreneurship or community involvement can enter by creating a YouTube video. The video should be 90 - 180 seconds in length detailing their passion and aspirations within their field. Participants should complete their submission by posting the YouTube URL on Twitter with the hashtag #ChangeTheGame. Each video will be judged for creativity, originality, quality of submission and the entrant's plan to use the $50,000 prize. LeBron James will get in the game by personally choosing the grand-prize winner.
"Over the years, LeBron James has proven himself a great role model by changing the game on the court and off," said Kimberly Paige, Associate Vice President, Sprite Brands, The Coca-Cola Company. "Through the Sprite(R) 6 Mix(TM) by LeBron James #ChangeTheGame contest, we look forward to joining LeBron and rewarding individuals who relentlessly pursue their passion and thirst for success in their craft. We can't wait to be inspired by some very creative video submissions."
Before James selects the ultimate winner, a judging panel from Sprite will select four finalists and provide each with a game-changing learning experience tailored to his/her respective field. The learning experiences include a mentoring session with a civic leader for the community involvement finalist; a meet-and-greet with a record label executive or an opportunity to attend a performance for the music finalist; a mentoring session with a business executive for the entrepreneurial finalist; and the visual arts finalist will have the opportunity to display his/her work on Sprite.com and on a custom Sprite item.
To enter, YouTube videos must be posted to Twitter no later than midnight Eastern time on June 1, 2014. Each entrant is limited to one submission per field. Submissions may not contain brand names or trademarks other than those owned by Sprite, nor may they contain material that violates or infringes on the rights of another. For a complete list of contest rules, please visit Sprite.com/change-the-game. No purchase necessary.
Retargeting is a standard tactic of ad tech. Visit a retailer site, you now expect to be followed by its products everywhere. More often than not, there’s a creepiness to it.
But sometimes retargeting can be delightful. Take a recent effort by Mountain Dew on behalf of its Baja Blast drink. The PepsiCo brand trawled Twitter for people missing the drink and reached out personally, even if the mention was a couple years old, in order to tell Baja fanatics that Mountain Dew was bringing the flavor back.
“Mountain Dew has a fiercely loyal fan base,” said Jamal Henderson, senior marketing manager for Mountain Dew. The brand tapped into that group, which has generated some 30,000 tweets in regard to Baja Blast over the last three years, by crafting 500 personalized messages to people who had mentioned Baja Blast in the past. According to Henderson, more than 83 percent responded.
Not all brands have “fiercely loyal” fans, so this kind of approach won’t work for every brand (as the Internet well knows). But according to Henderson, the brand trended twice on Twitter during the campaign. However, it took Mountain Dew years to respond to fan requests for Baja Blast in bottles. So while they might get points for responding to fans, they don’t get any for speed. Think of it as anti-real-time marketing.
Baja Blast will only be available in bottled form for the summer, so a heavy push says more about the brand’s desire to sell product than it does about their wont to please fans. “Sometimes the simplest ideas are the most impactful,” Henderson noted.
In addition to the always-on social component, the campaign includes a piece starring Dale Earnhardt Jr., Danny Davis & P-Rod – who come together secret-agent style to supply a convenience store with Baja Blast. As of the time of this writing, that video has 1,243,693 views and was posted May 6. A :15 second TV spot and a mobile app accompany the work, too, and of course there’s an under-the-cap contest.
When you have a virulent fan base, you can keep things simple and let them do the work for you. Dew’s initial tweet about the return of Baja Blast garnered 4,600 retweets, or one RT for every 75 fans. Not bad for a product they never intended to bottle in the first place.
Pepsi Max has today (12 May) launched a campaign called 'Beats of the Beautiful Game', which celebrates the sights and sounds of football, ahead of the World Cup in Brazil.
The campaign centres on a "visual album" featuring music from Rita Ora, Santigold, Kelly Rowland and Timbaland, among others.
The tracks will serve as inspirations for 11 short films by directors including Spike Lee, Idris Elba and The Kolton Brothers.
Each week Pepsi Max will showcase the songs from the album as a new single available on iTunes, with the accompanying filmtracks streamed on a dedicate microsite www.pepsi.com/thegame as well as YouTube and Vevo.
In addition to the music activity, Pepsi Max has partnered with Cine Favela, a cultural non-profit organisation that provides film education and tools for aspiring young directors throughout Brazil.
The films for Pearls Negras’ track on the "Beats of the Beautiful Game" will be brought to life through film by Cine Favela.
Frank Cooper III, chief marketing officer, global consumer engagement, PepsiCo, said: "This visual album is a celebration of different artistic talents and intertwines two art forms that up until now existed mostly in service of one another.
"With Pepsi Beats of the Beautiful Game, we are finally elevating these artforms to an equal plane and showcasing them on a global level.
"The ‘beats’ are both musical and visual snapshots that speak to the spirit of football culture, where songs serve as inspiration for the films – and the films allow for greater interpretation of the songs."
McDonald's executives are used to other marketers asking them for tips on how to do multicultural marketing better.
The company's role as the gold standard for marketing to ethnic consumers was recognized this week when the fast-feeder was named Marketer of the Year at the annual conference in Miami of AHAA: The Voice of Hispanic Marketing. (The first winner, last year, was Walmart).
Accepting the award on Wednesday at the Marketer of the Year lunch, Adam Salgado, VP, U.S. marketing at McDonald's, said "This recognition is for the journey our brand has taken."
Describing that journey, Mr. Salgado noted that the turning point was the 1980s census, highlighting the rapid growth of the U.S. Hispanic market. Later McDonald's got deeply involved in music, including the Latin Grammys; education, with a generous scholarship program, and sports like the World Cup. And more than a decade ago, McDonald's established its business practice of leading with ethnic insights, starting with research. Mr. Salgado also praised McDonald's U.S. Hispanic agency Alma for "their leadership, Hispanic insights and creative genius." (This year Alma was named Ad Age's Multicultural Agency of the Year).
In an interview earlier, after Mr. Salgado and two other McDonald's executives flew in from a McDonald's event in Orlando to attend AHAA's Marketer of the Year lunch, the three discussed their approach to multicultural marketing.
What do other marketers ask them? "We get a lot of questions about how we orchestrate it internally," Mr. Salgado said.
"They ask about benchmarking, ethnic insights, the marketing structure, how do you do the planning and budgeting," said Priscila Aviles Jamison, senior director, U.S. marketing creative. "You have to become an evangelist. Every year you have to do the job all over again. You still have to justify the business case for it. You have a new CMO, you start all over again."
"We also have a unique structure to have three different marketing directors [for Hispanic, African American and Asian American] who focus on their segments," she said. "They have all the data. We work closely with the marketing directors on strategy and planning so we can executive the creative. [They are] the champions."
The director of marketing for Hispanic is Patricia Diaz. "You've got to live up to the gold standard," she said. "We have to challenge ourselves internally to get to the next level."
Mr. Salgado said that the marketing directors for each segment work closely with agency partners for their segment and McDonald's franchisees. Each of the three ethnic segments has a committee with about 25 members comprising McDonald's execs, agencies and owner-operators that meets regularly; the Hispanic committee is chaired by Ana Madan, a second generation McDonald's owner-operator from New Jersey.
While other marketers hop in and out of the U.S. Hispanic market, and slash budgets when times are tough, McDonald's has a rare consistency and ranks among the top 5 advertisers to Hispanics year after year. McDonald's ranked No. 4 in 2012, spending $107.7 million, and upped its Hispanic media spending by 3.4% to $111.4 million in 2013, based on Kantar Media data analyzed by Ad Age's DataCenter for the Hispanic Fact Pack.
The company is also committed to an AOR approach with agencies, with relationships that go back 40 years with Publicis Groupe's Burrell for African American work and 20 years with Omnicom Group's Alma. Interpublic's Asian-American shop IW Group is a relative newcomer at 11 years.
McDonald's practices the diversity it preaches. At the AHAA lunch, Mr. Salgado and Ms. Aviles Jamison, who are both from Mexico, chatted in Spanish. Mr. Salgado mentioned that he and his wife speak Spanish at home so their two young children will be bilingual.
"We make it our job to know our consumers, and the cultural things that are important to them, and recognize this country is changing dramatically," Ms. Aviles Jamison said. For instance, she said McDonald's has been a World Cup sponsor "forever" but used to focus that effort on Hispanics, and mainly the Spanish-dominant. But soccer's appeal has grown—Ms. Diaz said 30% of U.S. households have a soccer player—and this year McDonald's World Cup effort will be broader, and in both Spanish and English.
An upcoming spot by Alma called "House Divided" mines the insight into a family that is divided because they live in the U.S. but the father roots for his home country Mexico while his son supports the U.S. soccer team. The father is watching a soccer game with his buddies when his son turns up with a group of friends in U.S. soccer jerseys. Eventually their mutual passion for soccer and food (from McDonald's) triumphs. The spot was shot by Mexican actor-director Diego Luna, who lives in Los Angeles and Mexico and liked the premise because it reminded him of his own family life and children who are both Mexican and American.
Another McDonald's brand spot by Alma called "First Customer" that debuted during the Academy Awards was named one of the five best ideas of the year at this week's U.S.H. Idea creative awards.
In a big year for McDonald's, the marketer will be honored with the creative marketer of the year award next month at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.
Singapore has more than 1.3 million migrant workers, accounting for more than a third of the country's entire workforce. As the migrant population has grown, so too has the economic and social gap between them and native Singaporeans, resulting in calls for higher pay and better working conditions. Coca-Cola and the nonprofit organization Singapore Kindness Movement decided that they wanted to provide a gesture of appreciation to the people, many far away from their own family and friends, building the wealthy city-state.
Together with agency Ogilvy & Mather Singapore, Coke used drones to deliver "Happiness from the Skies." More than 2,700 photos with handwritten notes were collected from everyday Singaporeans and attached to cans of Coke, then flown by custom delivery drones to, in some cases, as high as the 35th story of construction sites.
Eugene Cheong, chief creative officer of Ogilvy & Mather Asia Pacific, said in a statement that part of the purpose was to use a technology so often associated with violence in a more positive way. "By deploying drone technology in a new, creative, and entirely unexpected way, we not only brought a little happiness to two disparate segments of society but also built an invisible bridge that connects the guest workers to the local community."
A CAMPAIGN for Diet Coke carrying the theme “You’re on,” which the Coca-Cola Company introduced in North America only three months ago, is being turned off after being mocked in social media.
The ads are to be replaced on Wednesday with a campaign for the summer reviving the theme “Just for the taste of it,” whichintroduced Diet Coke in 1983 and has returned at least three times since. The replacement campaign begins with print ads and commercials.
The “You’re on” ads presented Diet Coke as a pick-me-up for young strivers, akin to an energy drink. A billboard described it as “how go-getters get going.” A print ad said: “You’ve got an 8 a.m. interview, a perfect black suit and three letters in your future: C.E.O.” And in atelevision commercial that ran most recently on Saturday, an announcer proclaimed: “When it’s time to be on, it’s time for Diet Coke. You’re on.”
Text accompanying the same commercial at dietcoke.com reads, “Whether you’re the best man about to give a speech at your friend’s wedding or Taylor Swift about to go onstage in front of millions, the refreshment of Diet Coke keeps you on.”
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The replacement ads, by contrast, are more traditional, straightforwardly playing up the brand’s taste and sugar-free status. The new commercials sing the praises of Diet Coke’s “delicious crisp taste.” And a new print ad proclaims: “There’s nothing like the refreshing taste of Diet Coke. Except maybe finding a twenty in your pocket. That’s pretty great.”
The abrupt end for “You’re on” comes after the ads were sent up by several advertising and marketing bloggers who noticed that in some ads the theme appeared above the Diet Coke logo so that it could be read as “You’re on Diet Coke.” (In other ads, the order was reversed: “Diet Coke You’re on.”) According to the bloggers, “You’re on Diet Coke” evoked a cocaine habit along with the history of Diet Coke’s sibling, Coca-Cola, which once included cocaine as an ingredient.
A headline on a post on the AdFreak blog asked, “Is Diet Coke Dabbling in Drug References in Its Ads?” A headline on The Huffington Post declared, “Diet Coke Trying to Act Like This Isn’t a Cocaine Joke.” And a blog named Animal created parodies depicting lines of cocaine near a razor blade bearing the Diet Coke logo.
Those reactions were far from the firestorms of outrage in social media that doomed recent ads from brands like Chevrolet, Hyundai, Mountain Dew and Reebok. An assessment by Bloomberg Businessweek magazine termed the Diet Coke campaign “a minor flub.” Still, once ads have been denigrated, derided or lampooned on blogs, Facebook or Twitter, they are often perceived as damaged goods.
When the bloggers began mocking the campaign in March, a month after its introduction, Coca-Cola North America responded with a statement that it “in no way endorses or supports the use of any illegal substance.” After several weeks, the japes petered out — but they, of course, remain available online.
The phrase “You’re on” was intended as shorthand for “the uplift” Diet Coke gives consumers, encouraging them to “bring on your ‘A game,’ ” Stuart Kronauge, general manager for sparkling beverages at Coca-Cola North America, said on Tuesday.
Ms. Kronauge deflected questions from a reporter asking what she thought about the failure of the “You’re on” ads. “We felt like ‘You’re on’ worked,” she replied. “It’s not at all that ‘You’re on’ failed.”
Asked why the campaign was concluding so suddenly if it was not a flop, Ms. Kronauge said that the new ads offered “a different way to talk about the brand” that will “resonate with our core loyal followers.”
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“It’s focusing on the product itself, the great crisp taste, the zero calories, the deliciousness,” she added.
As for the drug-related criticism, “iconic brands always create a conversation,” Ms. Kronauge said. “We felt it was mostly limited to the marketing community.”
The disappearance of “You’re on” is not entirely a surprise. Some Diet Coke ads in the last month replaced the theme with the words “Be ambitious. Not thirsty.”
A reason that “You’re on” was focused on younger consumers was to stimulate demand for Diet Coke, which like other diet sodas — and carbonated soft drinks in general — is losing sales to energy drinks, water, coffee and tea. According to the newsletter Beverage Digest, Diet Coke remained the No. 2 American soft drink last year, behind only Coca-Cola, but volume fell 6.8 percent compared with 2012.
“The whole diet category got dinged,” said John D. Sicher, editor and publisher of Beverage Digest, noting that Diet Pepsi fell 6.9 percent, Diet Mountain Dew fell 3.1 percent and sales of Coke Zero, fast-growing until now, fell 0.1 percent.
In general, said Mr. Sicher, who has not seen the new Diet Coke campaign, “Coke and Pepsi both need to make marketing more about attributes or intrinsics.”
“It’s very important to get back to marketing these brands, at least in part, as delicious, refreshing and tasting good, and worrying less about brand image,” he added.
The “You’re on” campaign was created by Droga5 in New York; a spokeswoman at the agency referred inquiries to the client. Although the replacement campaign is being created internally at Coca-Cola North America, Ms. Kronauge said, from materials that have appeared in North America and overseas markets, Droga5 “absolutely continues to be” the creative agency of record for Diet Coke.
According to Kantar Media, Coca-Cola spent $26.1 million to advertise Diet Coke last year in major media, down from $28.8 million in 2012 but up from $23.4 million in 2011.
Coca-Cola is in the process of removing brominated vegetable oil from its entire line of beverages, including Powerade, Fanta Orange and Fresca, a representative for the company confirmed to Newsweek on Monday. The move comes one year after PepsiCo announced it would remove the controversial chemical, also patented as a flame retardant, from Gatorade.
The move follows an online Change.org petition from Mississippi teenager Sarah Kavanagh urging soda companies to remove the Brominated vegetable oil (BVO). Her Powerade petition gathered 59,000 online signatures, while her Gatorade petition had more than 200,000, according to the AP. Despite removing the chemical, Coca-Cola says it stands by the safety of its drinks, including those that contain BVO.
“All of our beverages, including those with BVO, are safe and always have been—and comply with all regulations in the countries where they are sold,” Coca-Cola said in a statement.
BVO is not approved for use in food the European Union or Japan. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved its use in food products on aninterim basis, “pending additional study.” Mountain Dew, also made by PepsiCo, still contains BVO, along with Squirt and Sunkist Peach Soda, from the Dr Pepper Snapple Group, according to The New York Times.
The Associated Press reports bottles of Powerade in fruit punch and strawberry lemonade flavors sold in Detroit; Omaha, Nebraska; New York, and Washington, D.C. no longer have BVO on their ingredients list, but some bottles elsewhere still list it, suggesting Coca-Cola may have already begun phasing it out.
BVO is used as an emulsifier in fruit-flavored sports drinks and sodas to evenly distribute flavoring oils throughout the liquid. Without BVO, “your favorite lemony-limy soda would look like the Gulf of Alaska in the wake of the Exxon-Valdez,” as the San Diego Reader put it in 1999.
“In the coming months, the Coca-Cola Company will be transitioning from the use of brominated vegetable oil (BVO) to sucrose acetate isobutyrate(SAIB) and/or glycerol ester of rosin (singly or in combination),” Coca-Cola said in a statement. “Glycerol ester of rosin is commonly found in chewing gum and beverages, and SAIB has been used in beverages for over 14 years.”
Coca-Cola expects the transition to be complete by the end of the year, and says Powerade fruit punch and Powerade strawberry lemonade flavors have already eliminated BVO. However, the AP reported that some bottles of Powerade still list the chemical.
The safety of BVO has been a matter of debate in the scientific community for decades. BVO contains bromine, the same element found in brominated flame retardants used on upholstered furniture and some children’s bedding and clothes. Research found brominated flame retardants can build up in the body and breast milk, and human and animal studies have linked them to fertility problems, precocious puberty, neurological impairment, and changes in thyroid hormones.
A history of BVO by Scientific American notes that in 1970, a U.K. study foundthat rats fed brominated maize oil gathered stockpiles of bromine in their fat tissue, and the bromine remained there even after the rats returned to a bromine-free diet.
Shortly after, another study confirmed that bromine was building up in humans. Bromine serum levels found in people in the U.K.—where BVO was in use—were higher than levels in their counterparts in the Netherlands and Germany, where BVO was not used. The highest levels of bromine were found in fat tissues of children.
In 1997, a man who had consumed two to four liters of soda containing BVO daily was admitted to the University of California, Davis emergency room for memory loss, tremors, fatigue, loss of muscle coordination, headache, and ptosis in his right eyelid. He was diagnosed with severe bromine intoxicationand put on hemodialysis, and eventually recovered.
Among the approximately 10,000 chemical additives approved for use in foods in the U.S., about 3,000 have never been reviewed for safety by the FDA, according to Pew.
The FDA removed brominated vegetable oil from its list of food additives generally recognized as safe in 1970, but BVO reappeared on the list a few years later after industry group studies “demonstrated a level of safety,” according to Scientific American. In 1977, BVO was placed on a list of chemicals approved on an “interim basis,” pending further safety studies, where it has been since.
“Any change in the interim status of BVO would require an expenditure of FDA’s limited resources, which is not a public health protection priority for the agency at this time,” a spokeswoman for the FDA told the Times.
Coca-Cola is launching a socially responsible bottled-water brand in China that will fund projects to bring clean drinking water to schoolchildren in rural China. It's Coke's first initiative of its kind in any market.
The brand is called Ice Dew "Chun Yue," or Pure Joy, and a single serving bottle costs 32 U.S. cents, just slightly more than local products generally sell for.
The brand targets Chinese millennials because they're concerned about societal issues and share their views on social media. For the work in rural areas, Coke paired with prominent local NGO One Foundation.
Socially conscious brands are not as present in China as in some other markets. Coke saw an opening to do something innovative, especially since the water category is "pretty generic" in China, said Pratik Thakar, Coke's VP-Asia Pacific for creative and content excellence.
"This is the right category because water impacts everyone -- you can sell it as a commodity, like 'Water is water, at the end of day,' or you can say, 'Water is so precious, some people call it transparent gold,'" he said.
A major issue
While bottled water may be seen as an eco-unfriendly luxury in the United States, people in China increasingly view it as a necessity for their health because water pollution is constantly in the news.
This month, investigators said China's largest oil company was likely behind a leak that contaminated the tap water of 2.4 million people in northwest China. And last year, 16,000 dead pigs were found floating in the Huangpu River, which supplies drinking water to Shanghai.
That's one reason why the bottled water category is growing so fast in China -- sales by volume increased 86% from 2008 to 2013, according to Euromonitor International. The Chinese bottled-water market now is close to that of the U.S. by volume, and it has room to reach more consumers in a market of 1.3 billion.
Coke already sells a water product called Ice Dew in China. It had a 6% share of the market in 2013 and was the No. 5 brand in China, behind several local brands, Euromonitor said.
'Drink Good, Do Good, Feel Good'
While Coke has initiatives in many markets to make soda and water bottles more sustainable, this is the first created specifically with the goal of charitably helping communities. The entire brand is designed around a cause. The new brand's slogan is "Drink Good, Do Good, Feel Good."
Coke's concept is bringing clean drinking water to schoolchildren in rural villages where droughts are common, or where people have to walk long distances to reach a water supply. The company says more than 50 schools are already being supplied, and it plans constant expansion.
The brand is targeting Chinese millennials because they're more vocal about social and environmental issues than previous generations, Mr. Thakar said.
They're "proud of being part of solving social issues -- they may not be very active, maybe not going out and planting trees and hugging trees and those kinds of things, but they see pollution and other issues and immediately chat about them on Weibo," he said.
The brand will also involve a wearable tech component in several months, but Coke is keeping quiet on details for now.
Agency partners
Coke partnered with BBH China for the TV commercial and local agency Amber Communications for the digital component. Innovation and design firm Ideo created the bottles. The labels feature three different visuals – a butterfly, a cloud and a sun. The product is being launched in 12 provinces before rolling out nationwide.
Could similar projects work in other markets?
"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," said Kinyi Choo, Coke's general manager for the greater China hydration category. Because of the market's scale, "if it works in China then the opportunity is fantastic. First we have to make it work in China. But we're confident about that."
