Clems produces a Pure Blonde moment
A James Vincent McMorrow cover of Steve Winwood’s classic song “Higher Love” is the backing music to a big-budget TV commercial for Pure Blonde, created by Clemenger BBDO Melbourne.
The 60-second spot, which features a stream of blonde-haired people moving through a city to form a river of blondes, launches online today and will premiere on TV this Sunday and in cinemas next Thursday.
“Research suggested Pure Blonde owned the iconography of blondes from earlier ads so the task was to take this imagery into a more premium space,” said Ant Keogh, ECD of Clemenger BBDO Melbourne.
Andy Meldrum, GM of marketing for Pure Blonde said: “From the outset, the Pure Blonde team felt there was a better approach to making beer which is why today we are committed to delivering a beer to Australians that contains nothing artificial. This year, we wanted to bring to screens that same sense of purity – a fleeting moment in time when things just come together.”
“We kept coming back to that feeling when you are able to let go of everything else around you; with the pace of life getting faster and faster anything that makes you stop, think and feel… That’s a Pure Blonde moment,” Meldrum added.
A social media element will invite Pure Blonde drinkers to share photos on Facebook that represent their “Pure Blonde” moments. The best pictures images will be used during the campaign, in a crowd-sourced video montage.
The ad sees a change of strategy away from “Brewtopia”, the Middle Earth-like world where the previous three Pure Blonde campaigns have been sent. After the launch of the last campaign, in 2010, group marketing manager Richard Oppy, told Mumbrella: “The question is: can we rebuild Brewtopia, or is it time for a new idea? That’s our big challenge.”
Credits:
Pure Blonde
Chief Marketing Officer – Andy Gibson
- General Marketing Manager – Andy Meldrum
- Marketing Manager – Alastair McCausland
- Senior Brand Manager – Beau Boundy
- Assistant Brand Manager – Amy Kearney
Clemenger BBDO Melbourne (Lead creative agency)
- Executive Creative Director – Ant Keogh
- Creative Director Writer – Julian Schreiber
- Creative Director Art Director – Tom Martin
- Executive Producer Agency – Sonia von Bibra
- Executive Planning Director – Paul Rees-Jones
- Managing Partner – Paul McMillan
- Senior Account Director – Peter Chapman and Brett Williams
- Production Company – Revolver
- Director – Steve Rogers
- Producer – Pip Smart
- Executive Producer – Michael Ritchie
- Post Production Offline – The Butchery
- Post Production Online / CGI – Animal Logic
- Editor Offline – Jack Hutching
- Online / CGI Team – Kirsty Millar/Jonathan Hairman/Manuel Macha/Rogier Fransen/Sarah Hiddlestone
- Music Supervisor – Level Two Music – Karl Richter
- Song – “Higher Love”, performer – James Vincent McMorrow, Writers – Will Jennings / Steve Winwood
The Conscience Organisation (Digital agency)
- Clive Burcham – Executive Producer
- Tom Phillips – Managing Partner
- Danny Robson – Planner
- Jackson Mullane – Director
- Alex Weetch – Digital Strategist
- Justin Ridler – Photographer
Media Company – MediaCom
PR – Liquid Ideas
Plenty of budget. Not much of an idea.
Watched it and was left with the reaction “And?” at the end.
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k
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What a colossal waste of money.
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You’ve got to be kidding right? An ocean full of white people represents “purity”? This is a disgrace.
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For real, did nobody consider the racial implications ramifications of this ad? The intent is irrelevant and the fact that the beer has blonde in its name is irrelevant, it’s irresponsible to represent “purity” with a hoard of just white people. Like wow, straya
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Did they make it to the egg?
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pretty impressive
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The beer for Aryans?
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This ad would bring a tear to the Fuhrer’s eye.
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Really? How did this get through corporate affairs? This is suicide – it couldn’t be more fascist if they tried! Even the architecture is reminiscent of 1940’s Germany.
How could anyone possibly think this was a good idea?
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Bring back Brewtopia!!
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“we are committed to delivering a beer to Australians that contains nothing artificial”. Soooo, unless you’re a white, blonde, 30 something you’re artificial?
As per the above comments – how did this make it through the corporate affairs, or even the common sense filter??
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At least it’s more visually interesting than the Gracie Otto Westfield film… Though that rugby player was pretty hot. Pure Blonde… Celebrating Aryan dominance in a beer bottle.
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This looks as if it was another agency vacation job. Oh, and it’s so white my eyes hurt.
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Absolute brilliance – this pure blonde moment is creative genius.
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I see white people…
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CLIENT: “We kept coming back to that feeling when you are able to let go of everything else around you; with the pace of life getting faster and faster anything that makes you stop, think and feel… That’s a Pure Blonde moment,” Meldrum added.
Sure mate, if that’s what works for you. Now just hand over the cash for the ad.
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Pull it now before it goes to air.
And look at all those names in the credits.
Shorter life than Carlton draught tingle i hope.
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Boring.
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wow they’ve already disabled comments on the youtube video lol.
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They could have saved themselves a lot of money and just filmed the start of The Color Run
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There were defo some rangas in there.
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Wasn’t even funny. Why was that a beer ad ? Where were all the people going ? What was the meaning of the Blonde chick ? I don’t get it. Where was the higher love ? Not sure what the Blonde Beer would be like, and have no inclination to try it.
Epic miss. Just a another “big” ad with no concept, or even vague connection to a product message.
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A beer that tastes of nothing with an ad that complements this. Job well done.
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This is a few pillow cases away from a KKK campaign.
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Not sure where the budget was spent. I found it a bit beige…
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Proof will be in the pudding – will beer sales increase or will it be celebrated as a wonderful ‘brand exercise’ blah.
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made by white marketers who dont understand the subtleties of australian diversity today. Something seemingly innocent can actually divide a population without a bit of foresight.
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It’s the perfect ad for this mildly hop-infused soft drink.
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I thought the idea is to sell beer in a beer commercial. That won’t. But people “racial overtones” hardly, its just a crappy commercial….
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“we are committed to delivering a beer to Australians that contains nothing artificial”.
…………….and we are going to do it with a bunch of people whose hair colour is mostly artificial.
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Client – “remember that “Big Ad”… i liked that and it got played on lots of TV shows, i want that”
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Nice song…..beautifully shot….but um hello this isn’t 1940’s Germany! How did they ever think this was a good concept??? Get a bunch of white blondes (with the odd ranga)…..dress them in white and have them invade the streets and take over what looks like a 1940’s German city.
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Wow. Aren’t we a positive lot. Perhaps mUmBRELLA should start an industry focus group service for agencies before launching TVCs?
PB’s community seem to be fairly happy with the piece…without one reference to KKK or white supremacy (would be fascinated to see if they have a crisis plan for this or even considered it as a way the audience could read it!)
https://www.facebook.com/PureBlonde
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Hasn’t Pure Blonde been one of CUBs success stories? This feels like a repositioning exercise even if it’s not meant to be. So who is this now for? Not the average bloke looking for a low carb beer that he’s happy to be seen with. The only blonde moment in this misadventure was when the idea was signed off.
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Just checked the long list of people credits – 3 germanic-ish names in the credits, now you Aryan conspiracy people can really go to town……
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Is anyone else getting a distinct Pamplona vibe from this ad?
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wow.. this is meant to make me want to purchase the product?
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An Ad as bland as the beer…
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So much money spent creating this piece of magnificent mediocre media and they can’t afford to pay someone to monitor or moderate their Youtube comments?
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I think they were chasing a few coloured people down the subway and out of their beautiful city
Seriously guys get proper focus groups for your animatics. Even if this limits creativity it should definitely help filter out stuff like this.
I mean how can you even come up with a blonde moment? Is that a moment of utter dumbness?
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@The Internetz
Does 2 people commenting out of 217k+ fans = “PB’s community seem to be fairly happy with the piece” …. me thinks you might work at an agency or at a beer brand that might be somehow related to this campaign.
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The Fuhrer would approve…
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It’s been a long time between drinks. Clearly client and agency have been working on a new direction for a long time. With the complete shift in positioning and brand personality, this has a strong stench of being backed in to giving the client what they want. The ad isn’t the real problem – it’s the strategy.
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It’s like the old Draught ‘Big’ ad but with all the fun, life and creativity bleached out of it.
Which to be fair is what the beer tastes like.
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thought moonraker was better personally
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Couldn’t agree more with previous comments re white supremacy and the perceived desire to be young and blonde, even if it’s peroxide fake. Ads like this are what makes the whole industry a pathetic joke, with creative tossers being paid inordinate sums to produce peurile rubbish that doesn’t even work on a subliminal or shallow level. The makers of this might feel clever they got a paid holiday to shoot it in Prague (or the Warsaw ghetto or wherever) but you could have achieved the whole thing in a studio in Redfern with a few dumb models and apt use of CG. Love to know what the budget was, but whatever it was, it was a huge waste of money and time. Dumb and dumber blonde. And the beer’s shite.
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WOW I guess people see what they want to see.
What I SEE is beer moving down the street – does anyone else see this? … a ‘pure blond moment’
I think it’s BEAUTIFUL!! .
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Great concept, particularly the near subliminal water flow. Interesting how many of the above comments have sought out more sinister overtones – get over it!. I think I saw a ranga as well
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@ kieran
What makes this whole industry a pathetic joke are your comments. You’re not the only culprit but the general level of disrespect and negativity in response to this ad, all hidden behind anonymous posts, is what’s f_cked.
I’m not saying I like the ad, nor do I hate it. But go take your “under paid career going no where” frustrations out somewhere else.
Get over yourselves people, do you honestly think CUB would put this out as a deliberate reference to nazis etc. Do something useful with your armchair humanitarianism and sponsor a starving child or something.
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TV ad?
I rarely watch TV these days.
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Fantastic advertisement!
We shall order 1000 cases to celebrate Germany’s victory in The War.
Beware, ze Germans are coming.
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They get a tick for cutting through the dross on tele, which isn’t hard, but sorely lacking. If this is mediocre, then at least it raises the bar to that level.
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Wow a CMO, a general marketing manager, a marketing manager, a senior brand manager and an assistant brand manager. Is that enough?
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Great ad!!
For those pathetic People who some how think the ad is racist you need to get a life.
Why ruin a fantastic add by having impurities in it.
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Just watched it again. I still don’t get it. Maybe I’m too dumb. I’ll drink Carlton Draught.
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Yes it’s a very pretty ad but it doesn’t do one thing that’s really important to the client, the brewer: it doesn’t make me want to drink beer – especially that brand now. This ad goes way over the heads of the most important people – beer drinkers. I long for the days of the old VB campaign of “a hard earned thirst needs a big cold beer”… that made me thirsty for a beer… matter of fact i’ve got it now!
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The first question that comes to mind after seeing that clip is what are those blonde people chasing? Jews? Coloureds? It doesn’t actually make me want to get up a buy a beer. If the purpose of the ad was to make me buy its beer, the ad has failed.
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Guys, come on, I’m chinese and I don’t think it’s racist at all.
If it where a carlton draught add then i would get your point but the beer is called “pure blonde”
The blonde people represent the beer (pure blonde) and the staircase is the nose of the bottle, the beer is being drank but someone who’s about to get a pure blonde moment.
People are too politically correct that they are failing to see the message.
By the way I’m not saying it’s a good add.
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That moment when it becomes a river of zombies: http://youtu.be/HcwTxRuq-uk?t=1m54s
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No blonde jokes?
Come on… Blonde moment – surely you guys can see that….
Aye? Aye? Nudge nudge wink wink know what I mean aye?
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You ..cking idiots!!!!!!!!!! and who ever is insulting that song ..ck off and stop trying to sing you complete ..cking twat
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C’mon, what city was it shot in?
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Where’s the girl in the red coat? As for German architecture? I don’t think so. I think that the company made an ad that left people going, wtf? not thinking that this is a clumsy, racist campaign that depicts blondes as a pure race. It is a metaphor, not literal.
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I just saw the ad on TV, i’m really concern how this commercial will shape people’s perception about Australia and Australians. We have a harmonised society, but the mainstream media and advertisers never seem to understand what multiculturalism is. I feel like we are going backward into creating a whiter Australia.
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I thought the ad was a copy of the Guinness one with fat blokes running in color on a field.
Just place brand name here… Pure creativity I’m sure.
Wife doesn’t comment on crap ads at all but she said it looked racist, she is Asian BTW.
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Wow…”higher love”. They don’t exclude people that aren’t blonde – there are definitely brunettes. The only people they exclude are coloured… How did this ad make it to television?
WHITE POWER!!! Woot :/
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