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MANILA – A multiple Lotus winner at AdFest 2014, Ace Saatchi & Saatchi’s ‘ZZZ Radio’ for Pampers was praised for its genius and simplicity.
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“Beautifully simple, beautifully low tech and had a lot of power to improve people’s lives,” Jury President Andy Wilson, Head of Strategy, Asia BBDO & Proximity Singapore said of the campaign, which was awarded Media Lotus Gold, Direct Radio Gold, Radio Lotus Silver, and Promo Silver.
Ace Saatchi & Saatchi Executive Creative Director Andrew Petch answered a few questions about the campaign.
The ‘ZZZ Radio’ campaign is so mind-bogglingly genius in its simplicity, how come no one’s thought of it before, and what was the reaction from the client when it was first pitched?
Yes agree, the ZZZ idea does have what all good ideas have and that’s simplicity to the point of ‘why didn’t I think of that’. Maybe a reason why no one has ever implemented it is because for a radio station to be commercially viable, they need advertisers, and advertising is the one thing that this station didn’t need. So perhaps anyone who may have struck upon the idea didn’t see the immediate monetary gain in executing it.
However, we were not using the station directly to make a profit, we were using it to create a meaningful relationship with with our audience by creating something genuinely beneficial to them – and thus inspiring them to seek out our brand at another touchpoint where the sale could be secured.
As far as the word ‘genius’ Ill let others be the judge of that, but certainly ideas like this do make a good argument to counter the old saying ‘there’s no original ideas left in the world’. Our clients at P&G first and foremost are great clients so they as much as we do appreciate strong ideas, hence their reaction was immediately positive and why this was implemented. But certainly the added value this idea had was it cost almost nothing to produce and sustain.
Jury member Andy Wilson said that the creatives at Saatchi must have had babies on the brain in coming up with ‘ZZZ Radio’. How did the campaign come about? What was the client brief?
Yes I saw Andy’s comment. The brief from Pampers is a product driven one that Pampers diapers are more absorbent and comfortable so babies get uninterrupted sleep. (And obviously Moms also). So yes the team did have babies on the brain to answer this brief, but it was amongst endless different audiences, products, services and social issues they constantly have on their brain answering our all our client briefs.
What were some of the challenges in actually executing the concept?
Actually this was one of the few times I can sincerely say that there weren’t too many real challenges in bringing this concept to fruition. The journey in creating this was fairly smooth.
How did you find out ‘ZZZ Radio;’ had won, and how did you celebrate?
I was lucky enough to be given a fairly strong tip to get our team to board a plane to AdFest, which we are very grateful for. It meant a lot to the team here at Ace Saatchi & Saatchi to have that opportunity to experience their win first hand.
I personally remember a time early on in my career when we won the Grand Prix at the New York Festivals but were notified too late to fly to New York for the show. So when something like this happens I don’t want our guys to ever miss that moment. Naturally we had a great celebration after the show. The only thing is the show went for two nights, so the celebration was a little more subdued the second night.
