Direct Line x RoboCop - We're On It

Direct Line’s campaign featuring Harvey Keitel as his Pulp Fiction character Winston ‘The Wolf’ Wolf had been running with huge success for six years. But, Direct Line realised that a refreshed campaign was needed to focus on the future of the brand and build on the successes of their previous work. Direct Line wanted to focus on the speed of their customer service when responding to customer issues such as leaky pipes, broken down cars or stolen laptops.

Over the course of a few months, Born Licensing sourced and presented over 150 different movie, TV and cartoon characters known either for being problem solvers, for having high intelligence, or for being traditional superhero figures. As the creative team whittled down the list, we began engaging with the relevant Rights Holders to explore the feasibility of using their characters, by walking them through the initial creative direction and beginning negotiations of commercial terms, should their character be chosen.

Direct Line’s creative agency Saatchi & Saatchi reached out to Born Licensing with an incredibly strong creative direction, focusing on ‘We’re On It’ as a core theme. The goal was to showcase Direct Line as being so fast, so efficient and so reliable that they would beat even the most iconic hero characters to solve customer problems. Our role, as licensing experts, was to help them explore potential famous hero characters that could feature in the campaign.

After an extensive shortlisting process, Direct Line and Saatchi & Saatchi chose three final characters: Bumblebee from the Transformers franchise, Donatello from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and RoboCop. As Born Licensing are licensing agents for Hasbro (Rights Holders of the Transformers franchise), Viacom Nickolodeon (Rights Holders of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) and MGM (Rights Holders of RoboCop), we were able to negotiate the commercial terms of the licensing as well as manage all other aspects of the project from start to finish - without charging any clearance fees.

Born Licensing’s David Born attended the shoot in Cape Town and was on site to help Saatchi & Saatchi and Direct Line with any licensing related issues throughout. While on set he had the opportunity to have his photo taken with RoboCop himself!

MGM, the Rights Holders of RoboCop, had to be kept in the loop across all creative development. This included the script, storyboards, still poses, edits and final material. We spent a lot of time before the shoot working with Saatchi & Saatchi and the special effects studio who was hired to develop a special suit based on the original 1986 RoboCop. MGM provided us with turnaround artwork to guide the design and we submitted photos to them throughout development to ensure they were happy with how the suit was looking. We also shared details about the actor playing RoboCop which MGM reviewed and approved. Born Licensing managed the entire approval process from start to finish, allowing all other parties to focus on what they do best.

The campaign launched in style, with a world-first ad break takeover across both TV and video-on-demand, covering ITV, Channel 4 and Sky simultaneously. Starting with a bespoke introduction for each channel, followed by one 60-second and two 30-second ads running in the same TV ad break, the campaign made its mark instantly. The launch moment alone reached 7.5 million people. Following the TV launch, the out of home material launched with 48 sheet posters and bus advertising.

This was a huge project for all involved, and Born Licensing were an integral part for almost 12 months prior to the campaign’s launch. The entire licensing process, including research and development, negotiation of terms, the contractual process, invoicing and the approval processes were handled by us, allowing the other parties involved to focus on their roles.