Do All Canadians Live in Igloos?

2007 Year in Review I Canada

A common stereotype for those who have never visited our fine country is that it’s cold the year round, it snows all the time, and that many of us have dog sleds in the driveway. While many readers will realize that this is ridiculous, it pays to know what your consumers will pay attention to.

This kind of thinking turned out to be very successful for us in one of our most recent campaigns. When you understand your customers’ beliefs and preferences and speak to them in a way that resonates, the likelihood that they will be receptive to your message increases significantly. In an advertising world filled with clutter, it pays to get noticed. Our work, our clients’ business and the impact we have on consumers are all positively affected when we’re able to break through.

With the price of media consistently increasing and with new media opportunities popping up everywhere, ineffective media buying/planning and ambient clutter are obstacles that every campaign faces. For instance, in a subway terminal alongside hundreds of advertisers, retail stores and traffic, many key elements play a role in achieving a campaign that consumers actually interact with, as opposed to a campaign that they just “see”.

We approached this problem with many tactics in mind: the creative must stand out to be noticed, the message must be relevant, and advantageous placement of the media is pivotal. The true success of our campaign, however, was due to the target of the message being specific to the environment in which we were about to dominate. Maximizing the use of each and every medium is becoming more and more important in order to be recognized.

" Beer at the ACC - $10.
Beer at your
friend's place - free. "

In this case, we started with the standard that Canadians love hockey. In an attempt to build brand preference and brand attachment scores, Samsung Canada wanted to tap into the passion for the game. We decided to hit consumers with the message, “The game’s better at home on hockey’s HDTV” at the tunnel entrance to the Air Canada Center (ACC): The Toronto Maple Leafs arena. With the benefits of HDTV, the idea was that the best seats in the house are now at your house. Those walking into the ACC were hit with lines like, “LCD vs. ACC” and “Plasma vs. Platinum”. With the average price of Platinum tickets being in the $300 range, a family of four can buy an HDTV for the price of admission. The creative was full of other humorous analogies such as, “Beer at the ACC – $10. Beer at your friend’s place – free.”

We wanted to make certain that consumers knew that this was a lighthearted, innocent comparison to an arena that’s been sold out for decades. To ensure that our creative would stand out, we went with an integrated look and feel, using white ice as the visual cue to contrast the dark and drab subway station. The creative was hugely successful in emerging from its environment.


Stereotypes Pay Off

Two days after the campaign was posted, our broadcast partner received complaints from the ACC (owned by the Toronto Maple Leafs); they were not happy with consumers being hit with our message as they walked in and out of the ACC experience. Privately, they knew that there was nothing they could do about it; we had tapped into true, relevant fan experiences and we were having a bit of fun at the arena’s expense. The result is a campaign that people are spending time reading and chuckling about. And more importantly, our clients are very proud of the work and believe it’s effectively leveraging our hockey sponsorship.

So while we may not all live in igloos, some Canadian stereotypes turn out to be true: we love our hockey; and Cheil’s not afraid to leverage that.


By James Kawalecki
Senior Account Executive