Coca Cola's New Campaign Inspires Us to Share Our Good Times

The Coca-Cola Company’s South East Asia Business Unit (HQ in Singapore), has launched a fully integrated campaign that will roll out over the next 8-12 months in some of the most consumer centric markets, including those in Caucasus, Russia and Central Asia (CIS), Pan Africa, Turkey and entire South East Asia: Philippines, Vietnam, Singapore/Malaysia, Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Indonesia and many more markets across the globe.

Its purpose is to further entrench Coca-Cola’s position as an afternoon consumption beverage. Teens are the primary audience for the communication, but anyone who needs to re-energise and fight the ‘post lunch slump’ should find inspiration in the 60-second launch commercial.

The integrated campaign was conceptualised and produced in South Africa after FCB Africa put its best foot forward to deliver a world class pitch.

“In a nutshell, The Coca-Cola Company wanted a new campaign for Coca-Cola to position it as the antidote to the lurgy or lassitude that typically affects people in the afternoon,” said Pratik Thakar, Head of Creative Content & Design Excellence, The Coca-Cola Company Asia.

“It had to show that – from the pop of the cap or tab on opening, to the hiss as the gas escapes, to the clink and crack of the ice – the unique and delicious taste of Coca-Cola has the ability to ‘fizz up’ even the most lethargic.

“Importantly, the campaign needed to be relevant to Coca-Cola’s core target audience: Teens, that head-down generation always on the smart phone, always connected and always looking for the next thing to share via myriad social networks.

“As a result, the launch commercial takes inspiration from the speed with which anything visual and entertaining can go viral. One second, you’re torpid and dull. The next you’re sipping a Coca-Cola, on your feet and animated. The next, the meme your friend shared has close to one and a half million shares. That’s the power of the Coca-Cola antidote,” Thakar said.

The commercial opens with a group of friends sitting in a cafeteria. They’re all drinking ice-cold Coca-Cola’s except for one guy who is clearly battling the mid-afternoon slump. Someone pops the lid off a bottle of Coca-Cola under his nose. He wakes, takes a sip and immediately springs to his feet to do a little ‘jig’. This is captured and shared, and the meme speeds off around the globe, capturing the imagination of everyone who sees it before – within seconds – coming full circle to the phone of the guy who just ‘jigged’.

The commercial was shot in Cape Town over six days by Velocity Film's Adrian De Sa Garces. Given the number of markets it will be flighted in, post-production from Black Ginger and Priest was extensive to highlight certain visual clues and downplay others.

“This was an awesome vote of confidence in FCB Africa’s creative and strategic capabilities,” said FCB Group CEO and Chief Creative Officer, Brett Morris, “Kudos to the Johannesburg agency for being so spot on with the strategy, and much respect to FCB Cape Town, which did an outstanding job on the creative side. It’s great to see an FCB Africa campaign go global.