“Couch“¸ a spot directed by Jan Gleie for Febreze and Grey Worldwide was part of a campaign, dubbed “Breathe Happy,” that recently won Cannes 2012 Creative Effectiveness Lion. The same campaign earlier took Silver at the 2012 Global Effie Awards.nnGleie, represented in the U.S. by Madheart, directed English and German versions of “Couch,” which was shot in Berlin. In it, several adults are blindfolded and led into a squalid apartment filled with dirty laundry, smelly shoes, musty furniture and other malodorous objects—all of which had been treated with the air freshening product Febreze. The blindfolded subjects are asked to sniff things handed to them or found by crawling on the floor and told to describe what they smell. “Fresh air.” “A fresh, clean smell.” “Like flowers.” When the blindfolds are removed from their eyes, they gawk at their horrifying surroundings in disbelief.nnn nThe subjects of the commercial were real people who were recruited on the street and led directly to a trailer for blindfolding. They were then taken to an apartment that a crew had spent hours stocking with foul-smelling objects treated with Febreze. (The couch prominently featured in the spot was found in a dump.) The responses of the subjects, as they examine their surroundings with their noses, were entirely spontaneous and unrehearsed, and recorded via hidden cameras from a remote site.nnGleie often employs real people in the ads he directs (notably in his acclaimed work for Pampers, Target and Hallmark), but the clever ruse incorporated into this spot gave it a novel twist. nnThe spot has been wildly successful, earning a huge number of hits on YouTube (and spawning several spoofs). Since the campaign broke, Febreze has become Procter & Gamble’s fastest growing brand.nnCreditsnTitles: CouchnClient: Procter & Gamble (Febreze) nAgency: Grey Worldwide. Ingo Klein, creative director; Eric Straub, creative director; Anja Seibert, producer. nProduction: TwinFilm, Dusseldorf. Jan Gleie, director; Silvia Kirsch, producer.nnMadheart is based in Los Angeles. For further information, call 213.995.4555 or visit www.madheart.com. The company is represented on the West Coast by Lisa Gimenez Toliver (contact Lisa via email), Hot Betty in the Midwest (contact Hot Betty via email), and, on the East Coast, Dana Dubay (contact Dana via email) and Kelly Flint (contact Kelly via email).
Lisa Phillips Executive Producer Madheart Contact Lisa via email 213 995 4555
Contact:Media: Linda Rosner ArtisansPR 310.837.6008 Contact Linda via email
Who Needs Los Angeles? We Do.
One doesn’t have to be a statistician to know that there are fewer commercials being shot in the U.S. today for the American market than ever before, and a dramatic decrease in L.A. in particular. In the last five years, as reported by FilmLA (the office tasked with issuing permits), L.A. commercial production has dipped 31 percent. But here’s the thing: This doesn’t mean that L.A. has lost its importance as the production center of the world. Production in L.A. is vital. It is the go-to. It’s where you can count on access to exemplary crews, a support infrastructure second to none, varied location and backlot options, a large population of on-screen talent and (fairly) predictable weather. The fact is, with overall decline and now the devastation of the fires, we’re on the brink of losing this mainstay resource. Without employment opportunities and now many without homes, talented and trained crew are bound to leave either the industry or the LA area for other opportunities, unless there are enough job opportunities to sustain a solid living. Now is the time when we ALL must support and bolster this community. Production is needed in L.A., now! Of course, advertising is a business, and marketers’ money should be spent as efficiently as possible, BUT we have to think beyond each production and know that if we lose the incredible resource of L.A. production as we know it, then marketers, agencies and the industry loses in the long run. Over the past several days, some agencies have issued directives to production companies that are unilaterally pushing upcoming production options out of L.A. The fact is L.A. is a large area, and many sections of the city and county are not directly... Read More