ANZ continues Mardi Gras sponsorship with name change to GAYNZ
ANZ Bank has unveiled its latest Mardi Gras sponsorship effort, taking its GAYTMs to the next level by transforming the entire Oxford St branch into a Baroque-inspired “GAYNZ”.
The campaign, created by Whybin/TBWA, is the bank’s third installment of its GAYTMS series and marks the bank’s 10th anniversary of sponsoring the Mardi Gras.
The GAYNZ branch is a baroque-inspired celebration of LGBTI culture. It features two new GAYTMs, ornate walls, a marbled floor and 16 unique, hand-painted murals inspired by the LGBTI community.
Chair of ANZ’s Australia Division Diversity Council, Mark Hand, said: “Diversity, inclusion and respect is an important part of what we do at ANZ so we are particularly proud of our partnership with Mardi Gras, which started because our staff passionately believed in supporting the cause 10 years ago.
Speaking to Mumbrella Mark Hand, managing director commercial and corporate banking at ANZ and chair of ANZ’s Diversity Council, said the GAYTM campaign was what the bank, and its sponsorship of Mardi Gras is most famous for.
On why supporting diversity is important he said: “I’ve always been big on creating an environment where everybody who wants to work for an organisation. If you want to get the best out of an organisation you need to hire the best people and the only way you can do that is if you hire from 100% population.
“If you don’t create an environment where 100% of the population sees you as a good place to work you’re actually hiring from a smaller per cent of the population.”
Last year the campaign was the victim of vandalism, however, Hand took a more positive look saying the bank had no concerns.
“We don’t have concerns around that. We’ll never know what happened. Our view was it was at the tailend of the festival our view was it was people trying to souvenir. We’ve had no comments that it was an act of vandalism,” he said.
The ANZ Bank is also collaborating with Twitter to develop a rainbow-coloured flag emoji which will appear whenever #GAYNZ is used across the social media platform.
Four GAYTMs have also been returned to the George Street and Pitt Street branches. ATM operator fees for non-ANZ cardholders from GAYTMs will once again be donated to Twenty10, a not-for-profit organisation working with and supporting people of diverse genders, sexes and sexualities, their families and communities.
This year ANZ has 230 staff, family and friends set to march in the Mardi Gras Parade.
Hand explained the sponsorship began 10 years ago when staff asked to march under the ANZ banner at the Mardi Gras.
“They chose to march and they asked to march under the ANZ banner and the CEO at the time let them. It’s just grown from there,” he said.
Last year the campaign was extended to New Zealand and regional areas.
Hand said: “We’ve seen our GAYTMs go to Daylesford from a campaign last year. They’ve been to Perth and they’ve been to NZ. We’ve had lots of banks from around the world enquire and we’ve said absolutely. This is not about a commercial venture, this is about supporting a community.”
On working with Whybin\TBWA Melbourne, Hand said: “They’ve got the recognition they deserve globally with awards out of Cannes. It’s fantastic for them and we’re happy to be their muse in some respect, to be able to provide a canvas for them to show their creativity. It’s phenomenal what they’ve done and they deserve every plaudit that they get.”
Daniel Pizzato, senior creative at Whybin\TBWA, told Mumbrella: “I worked on the 2014 and 15 GAYTM campaign. We have a really good relationship with ANZ Bank and they’re really supportive of the ideas we bring forward and because this was a big anniversary we had to really up the ante. We worked on the idea of ‘GAYNZ’ and they fell in love with it.
“Aesthetically we wanted to up the ante and make a really out and proud support for the LGBTI community so we went to the baroque period which historically has been embraced by the LGBTI community because it is playful, flamboyant and fun. Then we fused in a few other traditions: tropicana and hollywood regency just to give it a bit more buzz.”
CREDITS:
Client: ANZ Creative
Agency: Whybin\TBWA Melbourne
Creative: Executive Creative Director: Paul Reardon
Creative Directors: Tara Ford. Daniel Pizzato
Creatives: Tim Woolford. Scott Canning
Production: Senior Producer: Janine Wertheim
Production Company – Will O’Rourke: Artistic, Design and Project Directors: The Glue Society’s James Dive & Pete Baker
Managing Director/EP: Michael Ritchie
EP/Head of Projects: Josh Mullens
Producer: Jasmin Helliar
Production Manager: Phoebe Marks
Production Designer: Sam Hobbs
Art Director: Sam Wilde
Construction Manager: Cameron Stanton
Scenic Painters: Andrea Davies, Bill Undery, Mark Dixon, Rosalind McKelvey Bunting, Colin Richards, Jo Allsop Graphic
Designer: Robyn Schremmer
Account Service and Planning: Regional Group
Head: Ricci Meldrum Group
Business Director: Claire Tenzer
Account Manager: Emily Gray
Account Executive: Jack Clemenger
Digital Planner: Paul Arena
Miranda Ward worked for Mumbrella from 2013 to 2017, eventually becoming deputy editor. Miranda joined Mumbrella in September 2013 from Sky News.
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ANZ now associates LGBTI with gaudiness.
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Good to see even the AE gets the credit too….lol
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I want to like this, but can’t. It’s jumped the shark.
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@Freddie, I think that’s spot on. Shows that an annual event probably can’t just role out variations of a theme each year when it comes to activations – even those that started off well like the GayTM.
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I will not take any of this seriously until someone changes their name to Mark Hand-job.
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Here is a novel idea how about a bank managing customers money and reducing fees rather than selling ideologies
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They should just be done with it and brand all the floats. Seems inevitable.
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