giffgaff Takes on Brexit and Boredom in 2019 Brand Campaign #Choosegiffgaff

This weekend, giffgaff’s 2019 brand campaign #choosegiffgaff launches during Britain’s Got Talent with a 60-second film created in collaboration with Blink’s Fred Rowson. The film is supported by the most extensive OOH campaign in giffgaff’s history alongside a crafted digital/social media campaign.

#choosegiffgaff is a playful yet thought provoking film, reflecting the UK cultural zeitgeist. It takes us on a whirlwind tour across a breadth of characters all being empowered through the freedom to make their own choices. 

The film dances through a series of scenes, as varied and bonkers as the formats it is filmed on, reflecting the myriad of choices we are free to make in what is now our culture and is set to Bow Wow Wow’s 'I Want Candy'.

giffgaff has always been a disruptive and market challenging brand, and their creative output continues to show this. Building on the previous 'Stay because you want to stay' and 'Free to go. Free to stay.' campaigns, #choosegiffgaff expands on the premise that giffgaff offers you choice in a totally inclusive way. Whoever you are, whatever you do, whatever your needs, giffgaff are there to offer you the best most flexible plan to fit around you and your choices. The freedom to be yourself. giffgaff are renowned for presenting a different point of view and is a brand which has regularly challenged the dominance of the big players in the mobile market by providing an alternative model.  In a climate where no-one knows where the next months will lead us the promise of choice and being in control is ever more reassuring.

The OOH is a quirky concept based on a recognised voting boxes format and tells the individual stories of giffgaff members across the country and was created by Made by Blah.

Abi Pearl, head of advertising at giffgaff, commented: "At giffgaff we believe our members should be in control of their phones, it's something we've believed since our inception in 2009, and what makes us 'the mobile network run by you'. Every day we work around the needs of each individual member, from analysing their usage and recommending the best plan for them each month, to giving them another 1GB of data to keep them going if they run out, or simply giving them the choice to stay with us (or not) with no contract. We do the hard work, so that the choosing giffgaff is the easiest choice people make. 

"Fred's creative idea for this campaign captivated us from the moment we saw it. To be able to tap into the current climate and subvert it with such positivity, taking people on a journey to celebrate choice, democracy, and control has been a delight to behold and be a part of. Working in such close partnership with a director who truly believes in your product, and not just the promise of the output, has hugely impacted the strength of this campaign.

"Having an idea so strong it can be translated simply into other media with the outdoor campaign by Made by Blah that features nine giffgaff members from all over the country, sharing why they chose giffgaff really embodies our 'run by you' ethos, making it more than simply a tag line. 

"In our most ambitious media plan yet, the team at Havas Media Group, have ensured that this fully integrated campaign will reach far and wide across TV, Outdoor and Social."

Fred Rowson, director at Blink, commented: "The brief that Abi gave me in January was something along the lines of 'please create us an iconic campaign for 2019'. On top of that, excited by my work as a writer and director on Years & Years' Palo Santo album campaign last year, Abi asked me to create a consistent fictional universe, full of recurring characters and detail, all interwoven between TV, print, outdoor and digital.

"Coming from anyone else, this could have been insurmountable. However, sometimes, you find your people, and that's what happened here. Throughout this process, Abi and I have shared a dream partnership, supported by a creative team at - both at Blink Productions and beyond - who were working at the top of their game. Borne out of mine and Abi's discussions about today's culture - political, spiritual and psychic - 'choose giffgaff' is our attempt to create a campaign that is both playful and meaningful; which is provocative in its reference to our current climate, but joyful in its celebration of democracy and freedom of choice. Hopefully, to anyone sick of politics, this can come as a reminder that, whichever way you vote, choice is something to be celebrated - not shied away from. It's a message that ties in beautifully with giffgaff's ethos. As a brand, they have always come across as a company that doesn't have its head buried in the sand: open to conversation, creatively adult and ambitious. All of this proved to be true, and I hope that this attitude comes across in the mad, mad film that we've made."