2014 was an incredible year for outdoor advertisers with marketers playing off the real world to bring completely new dimensions to their brands. Inspiring audiences and ranging from mini kiosks to rock climbing walls of furniture, all serve a potent reminder that outdoor can make brands instantly relevant and incredibly cool. Introducing the Top 10…
KitKat
Americans think of “Gimme a break” as KitKat’s slogan, but it’s more famous global tagline, dating to 1958, is “Have a break… have a Kit Kat.” JWT London found a fun new way to illustrate that line this year – with a half-finished billboard.
Gold TV
What better way to advertise a Monty Python reunion than with a dead parrot? To promote the live TV broadcast of a July performance by the comedy troupe, British network Gold TV and sculptor Iain Prendergast created a massive fiberglass parrot, which was suspended from a crane and laid talons-up in London’s Potters Field.
Flower council of Holland
For this lovely Valentine’s Day stunt, ad agency Kingsday installed 1,500 cute little red boxes around Paris, modelled after emergency boxes – but containing single red roses. “In case of love at first sight, break glass,” the boxes said.
Coca Cola
When Coca-Cola introduced mini cans of Coke in Germany, it fittingly opened some adorable mini kiosks in five cities to sell them. They even had a pint-size vending machine. “It’s the little things in life that make us happy,” said the campaign’s tagline.
OBI
This German home-improvement chain advertised its renovation products by actually renovating homes – well, parts of them. Ad agency Jung von Matt/Elbe measured out billboard-size sections of run-down buildings and fixed them up, delightfully showing the before and after of an improvement project.
Netflix
For the launch of Netflix in France, Ogilvy Paris created 100 different GIFs—some of which “reacted” to current events and even things like the weather—and installed them on outdoor boards. They’re undeniably eye-catching in ways other digital video just isn’t.
Ikea
More Ikea. Agency Ubi Bene helped the chain celebrate the opening of its 30th store in France by transforming an apartment into a vertical rock-climbing wall in the city of Clermont-Ferrand. The wall was nine-metres high by 10-metres wide and fitted with steps and grips, allowing the public to navigate among beds, cabinets, tables, chairs, sofas and accessories.
Apolsophy
This fantastic digital subway ad in Sweden for a hair-care line of products was rigged up to recognise when trains entered the station – and then showed a woman’s hair blowing all around, as though windswept by the train. Simple, playful, responsive and seemingly magical, the execution –by agency Akestam Holst and production company Stopp – blurred the lines wonderfully between the real and virtual worlds. (And this homage to it, with a twist, wasn’t bad either.)
Yaocho
People literally drinking until they drop, and sleeping on the street, is a persistent problem in Japan. Ogilvy & Mather, Geometry Global and bar chain Yaocho addressed it by turning the passed-out patrons into impromptu PSA billboards – framing them within squares of white tape and adding the hashtag #NOMISUGI, which translates to “too drunk.”
McDonald’s
TBWA Paris created some beautifully minimalist outdoor posters for McDonald’s this summer, with clean, simple drawings that turned the products into actual icons.