High Five: From the Good Old Days
Advertising runs in the Botwood genes, and I’ve been surrounded by creativity and adverts since a young age. I love fun ads and especially enjoy harking back to ones from the good old days. Here’s a selection of my all-time favourites, there’s a lot more but these five are something special to me...
Levi's - 'Creek'
Agency: BBH London
Production: Fresh Film
Director: Vaughan Arnell
Sound: Stiltskin
In 1994, I was ‘coming of age’ and I remember vividly this being the sexiest and most talked about ad back then. No-one had social media so it was all about adverts, TV and magazines. Levi's was the ‘brand to watch’ when it came to commercials, and this was huge! The song choices inspired the music charts and all the Levi's ads shot to number one. I think ‘Spaceman’ and ‘Turn On, Tune in and Cop Out’ shortly followed. The '90s were great! What a privilege to work with director Vaughan Arnell at Merman years later!
Extra - 'For When It's Time'
Agency: Energy BBDO
Production: Blink / Blinkink
Director: Nick Ball
This ad came out as the world was in and out of lockdown, and it truly captured the mood of the people. Whilst many brands were still boring us with filming zoom worthy content in 2021, Extra decided to have some fun on what happened to us during this once in a lifetime experience (we hope). It’s so crazy thinking this period of our lives was only three years ago. Remember the sex ban if not in the same household, home haircuts and scrounging for loo roll? And how awful did we all look! Beautifully shot, funny and memorable. One for the advertising archives in years to come.
Um Bongo - Original Um Bongo Ad
Agency: Leo Burnett
Production: Klacto Animations
Director: Oscar Grillo
Every 80's kid knows this jingle. It was so iconic. I loved animation, which is still one of my favourite genres. I would always drop a carton of Um Bongo in my mum’s weekly shopping trolley because I loved these cartoons (which she quickly removed as it was full of sugar). That’s the power of advertising. This stuck in my memory as did the 'A La Carte Kitchen' which I never owned because it sold out in seconds due to the adverts. Fun fact: My dad, Mr Bot, was working at Leo Burnett’s at the time, and claims to have a hand in the copy for the song, but not quite sure if he’s another suit wishing he was a creative and telling a few fibs…
Jaguar Range Rover - 'The Dragon Challenge'
Agency: Spark44
Production: Rogue Films x Carnage
Director: Sam Brown
Post: Big Buoy
Editorial: Big Chop
I’m a bit biased on this one as I did the PR for it. It was also my first job working for the brand, so I was extremely nervous and knew I had to do it justice. However, the great thing about this job is when the work speaks for itself. I remember first watching this in the CCO’s office and everyone was waiting for my reaction as I was one of the first outside of the project to see it. Despite being over six-minutes long, time flew, and it’s such a climatic piece of film. You literally have your heart in your mouth towards the end! Hats off to the agency, production company and director. I can’t imagine how the logistics for this came together, but my god they have absolute balls of steel!
Harvey Nichols - 'Gromit Bristol Store'
Agency: DDB UK
Production: Aardman Studios
It was such a great choice to launch the Harvey Nichols Bristol location back in 2008. Everyone loves the 'Wallace & Gromit' characters, and to see these ‘local lads’ modelling for the likes of Alexander McQueen, Armani, Paul Smith and Dolce & Gabbana was a stroke of genius. It won a multitude of awards that year and firmly positioned Harvey Nichols as a bold client who knew how to poke fun at themselves. A masterstroke!
