Volkswagen: Golf Ad Break Championship
Volkswagen is taking the traditional TV ad break away from the main screen, with a new campaign that pits all viewers against each other with an online race.
The new campaign via DDB Group Sydney asks ‘Why watch ads when you can play them?’. It will launch tonight via a QR code during The Project on Ten, giving competitors the chance to win a Golf GTI by competing in the ‘Golf Ad Break Championship’.
The pair behind the campaign at DDB were creative partner duo Tommy Cehak and Tim Woolford, who spoke to Mumbrella about Volkswagen’s open-mindedness and willingness to embrace creativity with its ad spend, taking more risks in the name of creativity while working with a tighter budget than some competitors.
“I think whether it be passenger vehicles or commercial vehicles, of which we look after both, we’re always trying to do something that’s going to help us stand out … So an idea like this sort of sounds natural to that set of circumstances that we try to set up with the client, which is how do we do something to punch above our weight,” says Woolford.
Cehak said that the idea came about following the shared observation that Australian life is becoming a lot more predictable and a lot duller for many in the context of COVID.
“The planner came up with this observation that some ridiculous percentage of us feel that work gets in the way of spontaneity and variety in life, but this Golf range is this fun-to-drive vehicle that takes the boredom out of life. The team came up with the idea of it being this antidote to the everyday… and what’s the most everyday thing we all come across? That would be the ad break,” Cehak said.