Milk Reconnects with Teens in 'Be More' Campaign

Milk’s latest campaign aims to reconnect with one of milk’s biggest consumers: teens. Helmed by Greenpoint Pictures director Jesse Heath, the 'Be More' campaign features real teens in the diverse and authentic subcultures they occupy. Heath’s work often takes as its subject teens and their subcultures, a passion that was instrumental in finding the talent for the campaign. Heath and his team took to the streets to seek out real youth, casting a South Central-based competition barrel racer and roper/steer rider, a cheerleading squad, and Muay Thai fighters, among others.

Says Miranda Abney, senior director of marketing at MilkPEP: “Heath was the ideal director for this campaign. The tone that we needed to get across to the audience required an absolute authenticity, which is what he’s known for. The choices he made, from the casting to the edit were spot on. Everyone knows that you can’t fool young people, especially these days. Overall, the piece has this vibrancy and tenacity that really resonates with teens, and stands apart from the noise in our media-saturated culture.”

Says Heath: “Growing up in the UK, milk commercials exuded a quintessential Americanness. With this campaign, I wanted to embody that same American spirit, and so my initial starting point was to look to two essential qualities that make America so special: diversity and determination. Though they all had different backgrounds and dreams, the real talent we found all had this young, fearless raw energy. Their vitality and fortitude seemed perfectly synonymous with Milk.”