This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page . (Learn how and when to remove these template messages)
|
In late 2000, UK bank Halifax began a long-running television advertisement campaign featuring staff singing popular songs with the words changed to reflect its financial services products.
The campaign was the brainchild of DLKW Creative Directors Malcolm Green and Gary Betts, who had previously found fame when they launched the Gary Lineker Walkers Crisps campaign. [1] Auditions were held and Halifax employee Howard Brown was selected by Green and Betts to spearhead the new advertising drive for the bank in 2000.
Brown was the first and most frequently featured star of these adverts. His first advert saw him sing "Extra", a song with new lyrics by Malcolm Green, set to the tune of "Sex Bomb" (originally by Mousse T featuring Tom Jones) on Boxing Day 2000. [2] The Adverts topped Adwatch, the first time a bank had managed this feat in the survey's history. [3]
The practice continued following the merger with Bank of Scotland, with Bank of Scotland employees were also allowed to take part, which was fully taken into account In 2002 with the "Somethin' Stupid", which feature Howard and a Bank of Scotland employee.
In 2005, at the height of Brown's popularity he toured the branch network giving Halifax customers the chance to meet him, as part of the "Giving you Extra Tour". That same year, the original advert was ranked the 13th best advertisement of all time by ITV in a top 20 list and in 2009 it was ranked as the 18th best advertisement of the decade in another top 20 ITV list.
In December 2006, Natalie Webster and four other Halifax colleagues Richard Willoughby, Jilly Ellard, Nicola Roberts and Paul Dudley, flew to Johannesburg to film the "Halifax remix" of Aretha Franklin's Think. The advertisement was first shown in February 2007. Another advertisement featured Thomas Yau from Leeds singing a version of Herman's Hermits I'm into Something Good . It was first shown in January 2008, though was axed in August 2008. [4]
In 2008 following a review of its creative marketing campaign, company reappointed the then newly merged DLKW and Lowe agency, to revise its advert strategy to make it more serious, [5] As advert styles were too upbeat for the then gloomy economic climate. With the move away from its upbeat singing ads, in April 2008, Howard Brown no longer starred in any more Halifax adverts, instead taking a role in its public relations department. [6] [7] Following the merger the Lloyds Bank, Halfax and Bank of Scotland took different routes for its advertisement.
In addition to the numerous singing and non singing adverts, between 2002 and 2006 an animated version of Brown also appearing in adverts, voiced by London actor Paul Shearer and created in conjunction with Paris-based animation stars Numéro Six, which used the "Who Gives You Extra?" at the end of each advert. The real Howard Brown has continued to appear in the live-action adverts. Further adverts were Written and art directed by Richard Lovell and Martin Cox at DLKW (London). In an interview with news agency Reuters, Brown said:
Being in the advertising campaign has changed my life tremendously. I sometimes feel like a popstar. People recognise me everywhere I go.
In 2004, the Bank Of Scotland dropped Howard from their versions of the adverts. The Bank of Scotland stated that Scottish customers could not stand him because he was "too in-your face, and particularly annoying". HBOS admitted mistakes have been made in promoting the new image north of the border, as it did not take into account the Bank of Scotland brand nor its heritage. The replacement advertising campaign instead feature Scottish members of staff, although the animated version of Howard were used north of the border. [8] [9]
Irn-Bru is a Scottish carbonated soft drink, often described as "Scotland's other national drink". Introduced in 1901, the drink is produced in Westfield, Cumbernauld, North Lanarkshire, by A.G. Barr of Glasgow.
A television advertisement is a span of television programming produced and paid for by an organization. It conveys a message promoting, and aiming to market, a product, service or idea. Advertisers and marketers may refer to television commercials as TVCs.
Tango is a soft drink originating in the United Kingdom, primarily sold in the UK and Ireland. It was first launched by Corona in 1950. Corona was purchased by the Beecham Group in 1958, and Corona Soft Drinks by Britvic in 1987.
Halifax is a British banking brand operating as a trading division of Bank of Scotland, itself a wholly owned subsidiary of Lloyds Banking Group.
Cadbury Dairy Milk is a British brand of milk chocolate manufactured by Cadbury. It was introduced in the United Kingdom in June 1905 and now consists of a number of products. Every product in the Dairy Milk line is made with exclusively milk chocolate. In 2014, Dairy Milk was ranked the best-selling chocolate bar in the UK. It is manufactured and distributed by the Hershey Company in the United States under licence from Cadbury. The chocolate is now available in many countries, including China, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Kazakhstan and Bangladesh.
Howard Brown is a former customer services representative and sales ambassador for HBOS plc, which owned both Bank of Scotland and Halifax Bank in the United Kingdom. He is best known for his appearances in Halifax/HBOS television advertisements, often singing and dancing.
Apple has used a variety of advertising campaigns to promote its iPod portable digital media player. The campaigns include television commercials, print ads, posters in public places, and wrap advertising campaigns. These advertising techniques are unified by a distinctive, consistent style that differs from Apple's other ads.
Domestos is a British brand of household cleaning range which contains bleach. It is manufactured by Unilever. Domestos contains 100,000 ppm (10%) of the active component, available chlorine; many other bleaches contain 50,000 or less.
Phones 4u was a large independent mobile phone retailer in the United Kingdom. It was part of the 4u Group based in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire. Opening in 1996, it expanded to over 600 stores. On 14 September 2014, EE and Vodafone, the company's final remaining suppliers, ended their contracts.
Evolution, also called The Evolution Of Beauty, is an advertising campaign launched by Unilever in 2006 as part of its Dove Campaign for Real Beauty, to promote the newly created Dove Self-Esteem Fund. The centre of the Unilever campaign is a 75-second spot produced by Ogilvy & Mather in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The piece was first displayed online on 6 October 2006, and was later broadcast as a television and cinema spot in the Netherlands and the Middle East. The ad was created from the budget left over from the earlier Daughters campaign, and was intended to be the first in a series of such online-focused campaigns by the company. Later such videos include Onslaught and Amy.Evolution was directed by Canadian director Yael Staav and Tim Piper, with sound design handled by the Vapor Music Group, and post-production by SoHo.
The Tetley Tea Folk are animated characters used to advertise Tetley Tea from 1973 to 2001, and from 2010-present.
Gorilla is a British advertising campaign launched by the advertising agency Fallon London on behalf of Cadbury Schweppes in 2007, to promote Cadbury Dairy Milk brand chocolate. The centrepiece of the campaign was a 90-second television and cinema advertisement, supported by related media purchases in billboards, magazines and newspapers, as well as sponsored events and an organised internet presence. The total cost of the campaign is estimated at £6.2 million. The central television advertisement was created and directed by Juan Cabral and starred the actor Garon Michael.
noitulovE is a British television and cinema advertisement launched by Diageo in 2005 to promote Guinness Draught stout. The 60-second piece formed the cornerstone of a £15 million advertising campaign targeting men in their late twenties and early thirties. The commercial shows, in reverse, the adventures of three characters who evolve from mudskippers to present day humans before tasting Guinness in a London pub. The commercial was handled by the advertising agency Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, with a budget of £1.3M. It was directed by Daniel Kleinman. Production was contracted to Kleinman Productions, with post-production by Framestore CFC. It premiered on British television on 3 October 2005.
Bet on Black, occasionally referred to as "Snail Race", is an advertising campaign run in 2000 by Diageo to promote Guinness-brand stout in the United Kingdom. The piece, directed by Frank Budgen, follows a snail race taking place in a town of Latin American appearance. It is the third piece of the Good things come to those who wait campaign launched by Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO in 1996, following on from Swimblack (1998) and Surfer (1999). The music in the advertisement is "Barbarabateri" by Beny More with Pérez Prado and his orchestra. Prado's music has also been in used in previous Guinness advertisements such as the successful Anticipation and Swimblack.
St George is a multi-award-winning television commercial for the British soft drink, Blackcurrant Tango. The commercial was created by Chas Bayfield and Jim Bolton at the UK advertising agency, HHCL + Partners and was directed by Colin Gregg at the production company Eclipse for the client David Atter at Britvic.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is the self-regulatory organisation of the advertising industry in the United Kingdom. The ASA is a non-statutory organisation and so cannot interpret or enforce legislation. However, its code of advertising practice broadly reflects legislation in many instances. The ASA is not funded by the British government, but by a levy on the advertising industry.
Compare the Meerkat is an advertising campaign on British and Australian commercial television for comparethemarket.com, a price comparison website, part of BGL Group. The adverts feature Aleksandr Orlov, a CGI anthropomorphic Russian meerkat, and his family and friends. Orlov is portrayed as being of aristocratic stock and the founder of comparethemeerkat.com: the campaign originally centred on his frustration over the confusion between his website and comparethemarket.com, playing on the similarity between the words market and meerkat. Orlov's catchphrase is "Simples".
Go.Compare is a British financial services comparison company based in Newport, Wales. Its website provides comparison details for financial products including car insurance, home and pet insurance and breakdown cover. Since 2021 it has been owned by Future plc. The company is known for its advertising campaign, which in 2015 was voted as the "most irritating advertisement."
"The Age of the Train" was a television advertising campaign in the United Kingdom created by British Rail in the late 1970s to promote its InterCity rail travel service. The adverts were presented by DJ and BBC presenter Jimmy Savile and featured the then-new InterCity 125 high-speed train.
"Milk's gotta lotta bottle" was an advertising slogan used by the British Milk Marketing Board (MMB) in the early 1980s. It followed the "drinka pinta milka day" slogan used by the MMB from 1959. The new slogan was an attempt to halt declining sales particularly among young people. The slogan was used in television and radio advertisements and on various items of merchandise from January 1982. It was judged as successful but was supplanted by "Get Fresh, Get Bottle" by the middle of the decade.