Ads & Ends
Nanette Franco-Diyco
THERE IS A 2-minute digital advertising produced by Ogilvy One Worldwide for Unilever’s Knorr Bouillon Cubes that captures one’s attention. There is good abruption in this online material where we are first led to believe that this must be some war movie.
It begins with young men being trained before they actually go on active duty. Good training, I thought to myself, sending these young men to honest-to-goodness forests, gingerly walking across hanging bridges, perhaps encountering snakes and forest creatures, and staggering through sun and heavy rains.
Then, out of the blue, a couple of cadets start fighting. One assumes what I can only describe as a fighting stance. Then ensues utter commotion.
Surprise, surprise!
Here, we leave the enraged cadets and the forest scene. We are now transported to a regular home where a family is about to have dinner, and we have a couple of siblings about to quarrel.
We cut to Mom coming in from the kitchen carrying a bowl, smilingly announcing that she is serving the family’s favorite dish, tinola. Peace abounds quickly in the family, and everyone enjoys the meal.
We cut back to our cadets in the forest.
Palpably, there is a change of pace: a cadet steps out of the dark, coaxing the guys to come with him. They quickly build a fire, and he cuts with his knife pieces of chicken and raw papaya. Real quick cooking. Out come bowls of tinola, which everyone enjoys.
“Ceasefire?” he cleverly quips.
With the opponents enjoying the tinola, our cadet chef is asked how he learned how to cook the delicious dish. Of course, he refers to his mom and her tinola as the peacemaker.
Ogilvy Senior Account Manager Alyssa Cortes explained that Knorr has been identified through the years with Mom cooking for her family and becoming a real heroine. This commercial, therefore, expands the Knorr heritage beyond the usual mother’s cooking. The creative team, nonetheless, was able to link the cooking prowess of the son, now grown up and out of the home, to the mother, still as heroine. Good strategy.
Director Pepe Diokno’s forest shots, going from wide to medium shots to close-ups, gave the viewers the feeling that they were indeed part of the troupe lost in the deep forest. The cinematographer did a good job dramatizing the cadets being lost, even necessitating the use of flashlights and building a real fire in the forest.
I like the soft-sell approach, without having to feature the mother actually using Knorr cubes as she cooked. It smacks of market leadership.
CREDITS. Client-company, Unilever Foods, Knorr Philippines: Oliver Sicam, marketing director; Jessica Innocencio, senior brand manager; and Marj Orosa, brand manager.
Creative agency, OgilvyOne Worldwide, Philippines: Richmond Walker, group executive creative director; Mike Sicam, executive creative director; Ca Abrigo, associate creative director; Renz Alajar, art director; Maan Bernardino, planner; Alyssa Cortes, senior account manager; and Angela Nuñez, account manager.
Production house, Straight Shooters: Pepe Diokno, director; Barbie Leyba of Just Add Water company, producer; Jenny Gapiz, executive producer; Diana Colon, production manager; Marie Advincula of Resultado Gourmet Designs, Co., food stylist; and Neil Lorenzo, production designer.
Nanette Franco-Diyco ended her 15th year advertising career as Vice-President of JWT, segueing into the world of academe, currently teaching communications at the Ateneo de Manila University.
