Laundry detergent is hardly the stuff of which creative ad dreams are made. But bucking that time-honored truism in this often pedestrian packaged goods category is a humorous, entertaining spot from Leo Burnett Puerto Rico, San Juan, and director Luis Gerard of bicoastal/international Great Guns, known stateside as greatguns:usa.
In the :30 commercial titled "Caught," we begin with wind chimes being caressed by the wind as they hang just outside a home.
Our focus then shifts from the chimes through a window to inside the house, where a woman is tending to domestic chores in an airy laundry room. She pulls clothes out of the washer and dumps them into a portable hamper. Picking up the basket, she leisurely walks outside and heads for the backyard clothesline. Upon turning a corner, however, she halts dead in her tracks.
The camera shows us what’s straight ahead—another woman who’s taken a pair of underpants off the clothesline and placed them on top of her head. The camera cuts back to the hamper-carrying lady, whose facial expression is one of mortification.
We then return to the woman who is reveling in the scent of the underwear, which is covering almost all of her face. She appears to be enjoying a peculiar sexual fetish.
In sharp contrast, the backyard scene is reminiscent of a slice of Norman Rockwell-esque suburbia—clothes hung out to dry and blowing in the wind.
The underwear-sniffing culprit finally realizes that she’s been caught in the act. At first, she tries to hide the briefs behind her back. Then she tries to place them back on the clothesline, on which other assorted garments and sheets hang, but the briefs accidentally fall to the ground.
She eventually makes a hasty retreat, first walking briskly, then breaking into a run. She passes the hamper-carrying lady, forces her way through a bushy hedge and enters the house next door.
This parting shot of the neighbor exiting the scene of the crime—leaving the first woman dumfounded in the foreground—is accompanied by a simple super at the bottom of the screen that reads, "Smells fresh." Two more supered words are added to that first message: "Smells clean," accompanied by the Gain detergent logo.
Creating this charmingly offbeat ad sans dialogue and voiceover for Gain, a Procter & Gamble product, was a Leo Burnett team consisting of creative director Andres Moya, art director Christina Burckhart, copywriter Victor Cabezas and producer Peremar Bravo.
Tom Korsan executive produced for greatguns:usa, which produced the job in conjunction with Burnett’s in-house production arm. Line producer was Luis Rodriguez. The spot was shot on location in San Juan by DP PJ Lopez.
Offline/online editor was Joe Blues of Bang Post, San Juan. Colorist was Leo Stagno of Cineworks, Miami. Audio postproduction work was done at Post Audio, San Juan.
The spot is airing in Latin America, with some talk that it might surface in select U.S. Hispanic markets.
