Bonds Birthday Project team to reveal story behind the campaign at Mumbrella360
The team behind Bonds’ ambitious Birthday Project will share learnings and results from the marketing campaign in one of the opening sessions of Mumbrella360.
The idea of the campaign was to find an Australian with a different date of birth for every day of the company’s history since 1915. Every one of them would then receive a free T-shirt, individualised with their date of birth.
The project, conceived by Clemenger BBDO Melbourne, kicked off in February with a blaze of publicity after a media event featuring iconic Australians ranging from Dame Edna to Sarah Murdoch.
At the time Mumbrella predicted it would be the campaign of 2012.
The campaign initially risked being a victim of its own success with a wave of media coverage threatening to overwhelm the We Are Bonds website which asked consumers to upload an image of themselves as they claimed their birth date. Uploads had to be temporarily suspended while the moderation team caught up.
The submitted images were later used in the next phase of the campaign.
Clemenger BBDO creative directors Jim Ingram and Ben Couzens will be joined by Bonds marketing manager Zoe Hayes for the session.
Questions will be moderated by journalist Jon Casimir, who works at Zapruder’s Other Films where he co-created advertising TV show The Gruen Transfer.
Mumbrella360 takes place at the Hilton Hotel in Sydney next week on June 6 and 7. Tickets for Mumbrella360 are on sale on the conference website.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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Still waiting for my T-shirt which I was told I would get….. just saying
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Happy 40th to Sarah Murdoch today.
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Ha! i was also going to say Happy Birthday! I wonder if she is wearing her shirt? Meanwhile, i still dont have mine:(
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Has anyone received their t-shirt yet?
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Mine arrived about a week ago – I was probably among the first to apply for them, so I suspect that others are on the way…
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
Still waiting….i had totally forgotten about it though….i guess that doesn’t say much for the campaign.
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i was one of the first, ain’t got nadda!
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I received mine a few weeks ago. it’s awesome.
BUT, I never have bought a bonds t-shirt and never will!
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I am still waiting as well. And I’ve had no communication from them other than standard retail EDM’s
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It would be nice if they actually ever delivered the t-shirts. I was one of the first to apply, still freaking waiting. Three months later.
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still waiting for my tshirt too….was told i would receive one …but nothing … sad face
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Yeah, I was also one of the first who registered… got nothing yet!
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It would be more impressive if the campaign resulting in more T-Shirt sales and less giveaways.
I’m sure the long suffering Pacific Brands shareholders would be interesting in something that resulted in more sales, profit and return on equity than the current management team have served up over the last few years.
While an interesting campaign its execution was terrible and ultimately Pacific Brands seem more interested in marketing campaigns than running a profitable and succesful business.
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Ha ha – Tim – You got yours because they are going to be on 360 line-up.
I don’t have mine and it’s a pretty stand out date. 14 Feb.
Love Bonds – Love Sarah all the same. Nice idea, not sure it worked though. They still send me random emails that have nothing to do with the reason I signed up and no t-shirt.
Jay.
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I applied within a couple of hours of the launch but missed out on my birth date.
Whatevs, I wasn’t in it for a free T shirt, but they have a pull-down to see who else “shares the date” with the date’s “winner” and mine is still blank.
I guess the client and the agency were so busy working on their award submissions and writing speeches about the success of the campaign, that they forgot to actually finish the job as promised to the punters.
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I like the campaign, but don’t understand the logic of “Uploads had to be temporarily suspended while the moderation team caught up.” This doesn’t make sense. Did this come from the agency or was this a Mumbrella summation?
Still a great idea though, but execution matters.
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Yes I was in early and was told a month ago that my shirt would arrive this month – today’s mail has come and gone but: no shirt. They’ve got my photo though.
Was this a sophisticated scam?
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Would be nice if they delivered my t-shirt! Ah, so that’s one of the learnings? Don’t promise something you can’t deliver????
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Hey Rawno. Good spot on her birthday. Apparently the t-shirt will make a nice 50th birthday present for Sarah.
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I received mine a couple of weeks ago.
So I’m alright.
Still a shame that their site isn’t mobile accessible, last time I looked anyway.
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Penned a little ditty this morning for the Bonds team. Shame I missed their recent presentation!!!
Dear Bonds.
Congrats on the We Are Bonds campaign.
And thanks for the t-shirt that NEVER came.
I wonder if you’re in the Marketing Hall of Fame?
Or more likely the Campaign Disasters Wall of Shame!
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Kelly – my Bonds t finally arrived yesterday. Don’t stop believing!
Cathie – Mumbrella
My t-shirt arrived yesterday as well. Faith restored!
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If my T-shirt ever arrives it will be the last bonds garment I ever own.
They export jobs faster than they can make t-shirts in the sweatshops of Asia.
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