Just Roo it!

Has footwear giant Nike signalled the future of promotions with its new advertisement for the World Cup 2010 in South Africa?
In case you haven’t seen it yet, here you go:


To get a sense of the incredible production values underpinning this ad, it only needs to be kept in mind that it was helmed by no less than the acclaimed director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, who signalled his talent to movie buffs with the 2000 thriller Amores Perros, and counts the likes of 21 Grams and Babel among his follow up movies.
The storyline of the ad, which features Inarittu’s movie-making signatures of jump cuts and intermeshing plot-lines, tells of some of the world’s best players, and their tryst with fame or infamy depending on their performance in a fictional tournament of the future. Vice president of Nike’s global football marketing division Davide Grasso put it simply when, referring to what the sportswear giant hoped to accomplish with its ad, he said:

“This epic campaign really captures the scale, emotion and impact that one single moment in a football game can have on a player, fan or nation.”

Here’s a short video on the making of the ad, including comments from director Inarittu:

The ad has been getting immense positive buzz in the media. Seth Stevenson of Slate says the ad is a series of “richly imagined realities”, and suggests it is all about creating a dominant soccer brand:

Nike clawed its way to the top by employing its gushing cash flow (which stems, in part, from the brand’s 85 percent share of the U.S. market for basketball footwear) to sign expensive endorsement contracts with a slew of major soccer stars. In 2007, Nike bought Umbro—official maker of the England national squad’s uniforms—for roughly $580 million. And now comes this monumental three-minute ad, which is without doubt the most expensive soccer commercial ever made.
It’s also the most entertaining soccer commercial ever made. Helmed by Academy Award-nominated director Alejandro González Iñárritu, the spot is a frenzy of quick-cut, hyperspeed storytelling.

On the unimaginably rich production values of the ad, which by conservative estimates has already notched up in excess of 30 million views on the internet, Seth says:

Only Nike has the juice to throw together this sort of multi-sphere star power and then buff the production values to such a glitzy sheen. The ad took a year of creative gestation from Nike’s genius ad agency, Wieden + Kennedy, followed by three months of camerawork and editing. It was filmed in locations including England, Spain, Italy, and Kenya. While Nike won’t disclose its budget, I would not be surprised if the cost to make this three-minute spot was on par with the outlay for at least one or two of Iñárritu’s feature-length films.
….
Perhaps longer ads have been made. Perhaps more expensive ads have been made. But when this spot first showed up on my TV, as I was watching SportsCenter late one night, I thought to myself that I couldn’t remember having ever derived more exhilarating joy from a TV commercial.

An interesting sidelight of this ad is the way Nike has used its creative energies to hijack an event it is not officially part of: Adidas is the official sponsor, but it is Nike, with this ad, that is getting all the buzz. Jim Edwards makes the point on a business blog:

Nike isn’t a cup sponsor, and the ad doesn’t mention the competition. The World Cup — coming in June from South Africa — is actually sponsored by Adidas. And yet the new Nike ad is so entertaining and star-studded that it could well wipe the floor with whatever Adidas comes up with.
It’s yet more proof that marketers can “own” even the world’s biggest sporting event without paying a red cent in contract fees — if you’re clever enough.

In other words, big ticket sponsors don’t really need to fork out millions billions in sponsorship of global events: a little creativity, a willingness to push the envelope, and you can do an end run around the ‘official sponsor’ and get far more bang for your buck. Here, for you to make your own comparisons, is the Adidas ad released for the World Cup season — compare it with the Nike effort, and tell us which you think is better:
The Nike ‘Write the Future’ campaign, incidentally, comes with an equally compelling print component. Check out this link for a stunning series of visuals. By way of bonus, here’s a video of Dutch band Focus, whose rock anthem Hocus Focus has been remixed for the ad’s sound track, performing the track live:


Since ads are the theme of this post — and since we have the secret intention of getting you guys to goof off at work — here’s a sampling of some of Nike’s best soccer ads down the years:
Good versus Evil
 
Mission Impossible:

The Secret Tournament:

Had fun? Now here’s were we really kill your day’s productivity dead — with a series of links guaranteed to keep you hooked:
The Best of Swoosh: Nike’s 20 greatest commercials of all time.
More Swoosh: A compilation of almost all of Nike’s soccer commercials down the years.
And then there’s this: Chicago Tribune’s list of the 20 greatest Nike soccer commercials of all time.
To take a more global view, here’s a list of the best soccer commercials from around the world.
Your turn now: Which in your mind is the best soccer/sports commercial of all time? Why?