Seagram’s Gin and &Rosàs Question the Limits of Our Freedom in New Campaign

At a time when we seem to have ever greater freedom as we become more connected, our freedom is being questioned like never before. That is the premise for the idea that &Rosàs has developed for American brand Seagram’s Gin.

In the words of Isahac Oliver, &Rosàs’ creative director: “This is not a cosy campaign, it aims to make you feel a little uncomfortable. It’s an invitation to think about all those times when –  without us even realising – data, algorithms, op eds, brands or just society in general decide how our lives are going to be.”

According to senior brand manager and content expert for Seagram’s Gin, Kerman Romeo and Telmo Pagalday: “This is a campaign that hits home because it is talking about something very current, and with the honesty to acknowledge that, as a brand, we are not the solution but one of the coercive forces we have been discussing.”

The central piece of the campaign is a 90-second video looking at the hidden freedom behind every decision, set in the iconic New York subway. The piece was directed by Nacho Gayán and produced by Agosto. Photographic production was in collaboration with fashion photographer Quentin de Brie.

Starting from the authority of a brand inspired by New York, the agency has developed a hard-hitting campaign that goes that bit further and is using advertising to mount a critique of advertising. A creative idea that uses data and algorithms to make us reflect on everything that they decide for us without us even realising.

Seagram’s Gin and &Rosàs have produced more than 50 pieces and videos aimed at very specific market segments with well-defined interests to make the campaign more widely known and to give it greater impact.

For YouTube, asking who decides which video or programme you decide to watch; for Tinder, asking who really chooses the person you are looking for; and for the national dailies thinking about how our opinion is now more than ever affected by the truthfulness or otherwise of the news. Those are some examples from the extensive digital campaign developed on the basis of the underlying concept.

The work goes alongside an ad hoc strategy in external media with posters and DOOH specifically responding to the space they are installed in, inviting us to think about whether we really are free or in fact being manipulated when it comes to choosing a restaurant, a brand of a product.