The pitfalls of an encore that is considered to have fallen short of its predecessor are many. Ad executives still talk about how the Wendy’s fast-food chain frittered away the huge success of its “Where’s the beef?” campaign in the mid-1980s when it could not develop a next act that measured up until several years had passed.
So it is likely that a new campaign for Oreo cookies, sold by Mondelez International, will be watched with interest. The campaign, scheduled to begin during “Mad Men” on Sunday, carries the theme “Wonderfilled,” in a play on words that mashes up “wonder” with a reference to the creme filling in each Oreo.
The campaign, created by the Martin Agency in Richmond, Va., part of the Interpublic Group of Companies, will include television commercials that feature original songs, print advertisements, a robust presence in social media like Facebook and events next week in Chicago, New York and Los Angeles.
The “Wonderfilled” campaign follows a well-received, yearlong effort for Oreo to commemorate the brand’s 100th birthday. The birthday campaign, created by DraftFCB, also part of Interpublic, carried the theme “Celebrate the kid inside.”
The idea behind that theme was to demonstrate how Oreo could transform everyday occasions in the lives of adults into fun-filled moments. The idea was brought to life in commercials by having children — bearing trays laden with Oreos and glasses of milk — interrupt routine events like commuting to work or taking part in a school board meeting.
The birthday campaign also included an effort, by a team of agencies that included DraftFCB, known as the Daily Twist. The Daily Twist was centered on ads, produced each day for 100 days, that addressed news events like the Emmy Awards and the Mars rover along with calendar milestones like Bastille Day and gay pride.
The birthday campaign concluded on Feb. 3 with two efforts during the Super Bowl. One was a humorous commercial, by Wieden Kennedy, centered on a “whisper fight” over Oreos in a library. The other was a wry comment on the Oreo feed on Twitter about the blackout during the game, advising viewers, “You can still dunk in the dark”; the comment — which perhaps garnered more attention than the commercial — came from another agency that is part of the Oreo team, 360i, part of Dentsu.
Whether all those birthday ads are a tough act to follow is “a great question,” said Janda Lukin, director for Oreo at Mondelez in East Hanover, N.J.
Although “we were delighted” with the response to the birthday campaign, Ms. Lukin said, “we always look to see how we can evolve and engage with our fans.”
“We think the future is just as bright with this new ‘Wonderfilled’ campaign,” she added.
By sharing something “as small as an Oreo,” Ms. Lukin added, it can bring “a positive change.”
That is illustrated in two commercials that help introduce the campaign. One spot, which runs 90 seconds, asks if unpleasant characters like a TV vampire would be transformed for the better if someone shared Oreos with them.
Would the vampire “not act so undead?” the singing narrator in the spot asks. “Would he thirst for milk instead?”
The other commercial, 30 seconds long, asks what would happen if “I gave an Oreo to somebody out there who I didn’t know.” The narrator wonders, “Would they laugh after I’d gone, or would they pass that wonder on?” (The narrator is Adam Young, who performs as Owl City.)
Jorge Calleja, the group creative director at the Martin Agency who serves as the global creative director on the Oreo account, said he believed that the concept of wonder is “something the brand could own.”
“Other brands like to wake up the athlete in you,” Mr. Calleja said. “We want to wake up the inner child in you.”
“The whole dynamic of having an Oreo, eating an Oreo, sharing an Oreo gives you a little feeling like a child again,” he added.
The birthday campaign “set the bar pretty high for us,” Mr. Calleja said. “We’re only here to top it.”
The new campaign is planned to run in the United States and Canada. Depending on the response, it may run in or be adapted for other countries.
Advertising spending for Oreo in the United States has ranged in the last five years from a low of $36.4 million last year to a high of $56.9 million in 2008, according to Kantar Media, a unit of WPP.
Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/11/business/media/creating-an-ad-campaign-for-oreos-as-they-turn-101.html?partner=rss&emc=rss