“Be Lazy, Just Vote”: Behind the Scenes of Channel 4’s Election Rebrand

When Rishi Sunak called the UK’s general election for July 4th, a lightbulb lit up within the offices of 4creative, Channel 4’s in-house agency. In a playful reference to the polling date, the broadcaster has made a tweak to its iconic logo as part of a campaign encouraging Brits to vote. 

Outside the steps of Channel 4’s London office, lead-presenter Krishnan Guru-Murthy held aloft a ‘th’ to add to the landmark ‘Giant 4’ installation. The campaign as a whole (entitled “Be Lazy, Just Vote”) aims to remind people that sometimes the most powerful form of enacting social change is the simplest – whilst also maintaining Channel 4’s distinctive personality. 

“It feels right for us as a public service broadcaster to encourage people to get out and vote”, 4creative’s deputy ECD Chris Wood explains to LBB. “So we were thinking about how to do that in a way that wasn’t too patronising or virtuous. After all, if you maintain a bit of humour then that’s ultimately going to make people more likely to engage”. 

As a result, the “Be Lazy, Just Vote” campaign will play out across a range of on-air announcements, allied to a range of social and influencer activity. Viewers can expect to encounter the election rebrand in connection with big cultural moments like Glastonbury and UEFA Euro 2024. 

The campaign’s lo-fi, DIY aesthetic (underlined by Krishnan holding the ‘th’ sign aloft via a tower of tied-together brooms, for example) lends itself to the wider concept as marketing lead Sian Gray explains. “What we want to demonstrate in this campaign is that voting really is the easiest way to make a difference”, she says. “So we didn’t want to do that with a high-concept, intangible campaign; we wanted it to feel a bit DIY. The right to vote is a great and powerful thing, but it’s also very easy”. 

On election night itself, Channel 4 is stepping up with a line-up that’s as close as British politics gets to rock stars. Joining Krishnan on the night of the 4th will be The News Agents’ Emily Maitlis, with extra commentary and analysis from The Rest Is Politics hosts Rory Stewart and Alastair Campbell. Meanwhile, Mathematics professor Hannah Fry will be crunching numbers on the big screen. 

Turnout has the potential to be a significant factor in deciding the election. And yet, one of the key themes addressed throughout the campaign has been the decline of trust in politics as a whole – or the idea that politicians on all sides will say one thing and do another in power. There are fears that this could damage voter turnout on the day, although Krishnan sees the issue as more nuanced than that. 

“We know that there’s a problem with trust, because all of the audience research we have available is telling us that”, he says. “But having said that, participation in big democratic events does tend to be quite high. A turnout of around 60% is, relatively speaking, high”. 

And yet, polls are reporting an unusually high number of undecided voters for this stage in an election campaign. In Krishnan’s view, that’s partly because too many of us aren’t seeing our priorities reflected in the political conversation. “It’s not that people are apathetic. A lot of particularly young people are engaged in politics but still deciding not to vote”, he says. “They’re looking at what’s on offer, and deciding it’s not very relevant to them. Take the most recent debate – Sunak was banging on about pensions, not housing, not tuition fees. It does seem that politicians reflexively tend to focus on older voters”. 

With the UK heading to the polls later this week, there’s a limited window remaining for the party leaders to connect with those potentially crucial engaged-but-undecided voters. But in the meantime, the Channel 4 team will be gently nudging all of us towards the ballot box.