‘Our brand best shows up when it’s self-deprecating’: Uber’s Andy Morley on new, true blue Aussie Uber Carshare campaign
Uber is “working really hard” to drive awareness of its newest offering, Uber Carshare, according to director of marketing, APAC, Andy Morley.
Morley spoke exclusively to Mumbrella on the brand’s platform, ‘Australia’s Second Car’, and its new work via PR agency Poem that launched on Wednesday afternoon featuring Formula 1 driver and adopted Aussie, Valtteri Bottas.
The new earned creative, which features Bottas’ second car – a full customised, Aussie-modified ute – hopes to increase Uber Carshare’s presence in market and cut through in a traditional rental car category.
The ute has been fully revamped inside and out, featuring mullet aeration technology, a meat pie warmer, an esky to keep drinks cold, a bike rack, fishing rod holder, freshwater shower, hills hoist, thong holder and built-in sunscreen and bug repellent dispensers.
Morley told Mumbrella that Uber feels the brand shows up best when its marketing and the talent are self-deprecating, which is the approach it has taken in every recent piece of work.
“Valtteri just exudes that humour, in such a fun and interesting way,” he said.
“We were drawn to his personality, what he stood for and how we resonated with that as a brand. There was a very natural idea to create this vehicle, which is just hilarious, and he added so much value.”
The brand platform, which was introduced late last year by Uber’s creative agency Special Group, was “one of the best pieces of strategic work” Morley said he has ever seen an agency do.
“That’s because we found it to be a very hard product to communicate, especially for a category that wasn’t as well-known of understood as ride share,” he explained. “So we knew that we needed to make this feel different enough for people to understand it is actually different, but we also wanted to borrow on the equity of the masterbrand. The complexity of wanting to talk about lots of benefits was simplified in the first campaign, and now we’re having fun.”
Uber’s masterbrand focuses on working with talent and celebrities that Aussies relate with, according to Morley, and Bottas was the “perfect fit”. Drawing on examples of other recent Uber campaigns including Uber One’s spots featuring tennis star Andre Agassi and Destiny’s Child’s Michelle Williams, Morley said sometimes the idea “just works as the talent is as excited about the ideas as you are”, and this new work fell into that category.
“He collaborated a lot in terms of the idea, and he even loved it so much, he wants to own the car outright in the future and share it on the Carshare platform for longer,” Morley said. “He was brought into the idea, and from day dot he was an absolute joy to work with.”
The creative was made in collaboration with Poem and founder, Rob Lowe, said: “The challenge has been to create an idea that’s simple, human and culturally relevant.
“Together, I believe we’ve been able to create something really special that explains what Uber Carshare is whilst carving it a place within Aussie culture.”
Morley told Mumbrella Uber’s marketing always tries to take an earned-led approach, “because it’s so hard to cut through these days”.
“There are so many ads out there that people are so good at ignoring, so if we just want to talk our brand, nobody will notice. We need a reason to live in the consumer’s world, and earned-led approaches with celebrities are often really good to shortcut us towards that.”
He explained that while any brand can use celebrities as talent, it’s how Uber uses them that gives the brand a point of difference: “You can’t just say ‘I’m gonna go out and get a big celebrity’, you actually have to have a great idea behind it, and I think Uber’s combination of the two is brilliant.”
Other cars on the Uber Carshare platform have been given the ‘VB road-trip worthy seal of approval’, and for the first person who books. they will be stocked with a VB road trip kit – air freshener, beach towel, drinks cooler, sunnies, and more.
A targeted influencer campaign developed by Hello Social is supporting the campaign, featuring Lachy McIntyre, Ella Watkins and Shepmates.
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Credits:
Client: Uber
Director of marketing, APAC: Andy Morley
Chief growth officer, Uber Carshare: Mathieu Maire
Head of brand marketing, Uber Carshare: Tom Walter
Marketing manager, ANZ: Ashley Martin
Creative director, APAC: Adam Ledbury
Strategy lead, APAC: Josh Pickstone
Communications manager: Bonnie Ko
Senior social media associate ANZ: Chanelle Murray
Legal counsel, ANZ: Jessica Shao
Creative & lead agency: Poem
Founder: Rob Lowe
Creative: Jessica Cluff
Managing partner: Katie Raleigh
Business director: Rhania Farah
Senior account director: Erica Llorico
Production:
Director: Josh Logue
Executive producer (Poem): Hattie Morgan
Content manager (Poem): Bianca Martinolli
Producer: Matthew Barber
DOP: Simon Ozolins
First assistant camera: Sian Bates
Car production: Sydney Scenery
Stills photographer (Sydney): Reece McMillan
Stills photographer (Adelaide): Matt Cherubino
Post-production:
Offline Editor: Josh Logue
Grade: Martin Greer
Online: Adrian Eppel
VFX: Damian Dunne
Audio post:
Sound designer: Kate Stenhouse (Electric Sheep Music)
Publicity/social: Poem
Social lead: Georgia Crean
Senior account manager: Robbie Purcell
Senior account executive: Stephanie Leung
Account coordinator: Lauren Duncan
Media agency: EssenceMediacom
Client & planning lead: Nathaniel Thompson
Group strategy director: Marine Turner
Marketplace director: Patrick Fakiye
Digital director: Matt Leahy
Influencer: Hello Social
Managing director: Sam Kelly
Director of client experience: Madeline Marovino
Group account director: Nicola Hanlon
Senior account manager: Charlotte Shackley
Senior account manager: Carla Wong
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Lauren McNamara is a journalist at Mumbrella, covering the creative and PR beat. She joined in November 2022 as editorial assistant, after completing a Bachelor of Communications (Journalism) at UTS.
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Maybe Uber should pay it’s own drivers more than shelling out for Valteri Bottas to do a stupid commercial. I am sure they paid him millions for this ad. Your a disgrace Uber
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this is actually excellent! Well done Uber!
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