Everyone agency has one. This is ours: The spot that got us fired. With Jet’s Pizza, DRIVEN was hired to create a new brand, increase awareness and grow sales. The strategy was to get noticed, be memorable, define the brand and have fun while doing it. Mission accomplished. For better or for worse.
When this spot hit the airwaves, the phones in the stores started to ring, but so did the phones in the corporate offices. Some people loved the spot, others hated the fact that the guys tongue was hanging out. Some folks even went as far as to say the spot was about oral sex. Wow.
Anyways, the Reader’s Digest version is that sometimes, even when your client asks for something breakthrough and different, even if they sign off on a concept, they’re not always happy with the results. There has to be a tolerance for taking the bad with the good and every client’s threshold is different.
In the end, we’re still very proud of the work that we created for Jet’s, because it was very different from anything else in the market that we were playing in. But, it was a lesson for our agency that even when things are going well for a client, business relationships and tolerance for risk can create a gap that cannot be bridged.
Best,
Your DRIVEN Team
www.drivensolutionsinc.com
In my experience, clients love the idea of being "edgy" but not the reality.
ReplyDeleteAt the end of the day, it takes a client with a strong stomach (and a big voice mail box) to handle the inevitably polarizing response to anything that pushes the envelope.
"Edgy", "memorable" and "breakthrough" usually don't equate with "safe", "familiar" and "inoffensive"...what I like to call "beige creative."
Nice work.