Holden starts its journey to the future with rebrand and Flume inspired soundtrack
Holden has revealed a re-designed logo and Flume-inspired advertising campaign as the brand prepares to market its way through 2017 and the end of Australian manufacturing.
The masterbrand campaign created by AJF Partnership in Melbourne will be used as the hub of all Holden’s marketing over coming months as it launches five new cars to the market.
The overhaul includes the change of the brand name from all capital letters to upper and lower case and the complete redesign of the Holden website to be more focused on lifestyle editorial.
Holden unveiled the new look and campaign overnight in Melbourne with general manager of marketing communications and digital, Natalie Davey, saying it was aiming to get Australians to rethink their perceptions of the brand.
Davey said Holden had been working on the shift for the past 12 months and had conducted in-depth research on perceptions of the brand which announced last year it would stop manufacturing in Australia in 2017, joining Ford and Toyota.
“The research was not any surprise, Australians want us to succeed and we have listened to them,” Davey told Mumbrella.
“Holden has always been a brand that engenders passion and loyalty, but we must move with the times. The journey we’re on requires us to have a consistent focus on brand building, to ensure we lay strong foundations for Australia to keep loving Holden for many years to come.”
She said that while the brand had addressed a number of different elements in the shift, they should not be looked at individually.
“I don’t think you can unpack any of the elements, it is a culmination of them all,” she said.
Mark Flintoff, product communications manager for Holden, said that the next few months would be one of the busiest for the brand in the past decade.
“One way to think about it we are launching five new products in five months and you will not find a time in the last 10 years when we have done that,” he said.
TV and social campaigns will drive new customers to Holden’s website where 62% of visitors are new.
Part of the promotion will include a social campaign where car owners are offered the chance to swap their current vehicle for a new Colorado, with videos of the surprise swaps seeded virally.
The decision to tap into the talents of award-winning music producer Flume is another element of the campaign aimed at engaging with a new generation of car buyers. Flume has produced a new track, Trust, featuring Isabella Manfredi, to support the campaign
“Flume is a young Australian that has taken the world by storm with his unique and breakthrough music,” Davey said.
“Already a four-time ARIA winner, he represents Today’s Australia. Flume’s music is the perfect soundtrack as we redefine the Holden brand.”
Along with the change in font, Holden has also brushed up the lion logo to be more consistent with the badge on the cars themselves.
“These are subtle yet significant changes balancing our respect for our iconic logo with the need for a fresh feel,” she said.
“Overall, it’s clear change is happening at Holden. The work is aspirational, it’s authentic, and it has a real-world feel with a confident tone and optimism about our products and our future ahead.”
2017 will be a challenging year for the brand when it shuts down its last manufacturing plant in Australia and moves to a fully imported model lineup
This is the most contrived strategy I’ve seen. Its just not real. Its like they just took case studies formal the other automotive ideas, and then executed it poorly as one.
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So what can we take away from these two videos?
Holden acknowledge that everyone hates the brand and prefers a Renault, plus the only way to get tradies driving them is to give them away.
Brilliant.
Not to worry, I’m sure the friendly lowercase logo will fix all their problems.
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Is the agency McCann?
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Holden has absolutely fckn lost the plot. Breathtaking to see. Never before has it been so apparent how ashamed Holden is of who it is, and how desperately it wants to be something/someone else.
‘Australia has changed and so have we’ is clearly the platform but it’s so contrived and so irrelevant for anyone outside of advertising that it won’t move one vehicle whatsoever.
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Hi Venga Bus,
The agency was AJF Partnership in Melbourne.
Simon
This is quite possibly the worst campaign I’ve ever seen.
This is what happens when you give an Australian icon to a bunch of urban hipsters who looks down on the largely working class/regional/”traditional” audience. Mindblowingly pathetic
“redesign of the Holden website to be more focused on lifestyle editorial” – yeah, but whose lifestyle? Holden drivers or agency kidz?
Ever heard of brand equity AJF? This is an Aussie icon and you’ve stripped it of everything that made it iconic. Well done!
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Marketing 101 Holden. If you don’t make cars here in Australia and just import cars you might as well just call it an Opel……,wait a minute! Didn’t Opel leave Australia recently. I am brand confused.
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The Holden Brand Launch TVC is an exact copy of Holden’s sister car line, Chevy, used in the US to promote the Chevy Malibu. All of these tactics being used by Holden are being leveraged from Chevy.
https://youtu.be/xLFREsAZo8I
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You should do a little research about Holden and its parent company. The brand launch video is the same as the Chevy Malibu commercial in the United States. Exact same. Just different people, talent, and of course, car. I would expect Holden to copy the creative approach that Chevy is having tremendous success with in the United States. If you had researched this, your article would be completely different.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6cSTBeaqFM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3fYqzGgEKo&list=PL7ufN7Cep1mHWN6_7JJVg0NoJoVERaCOB
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That was the top of the line Astra with all the bells and whistles – wonder what the reactions would have been to the standard shitbox variant?
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Thanks for the tip Jack
Simon