The Thinkboxes Winner - July 2008

Know Your Limits - Binge Drinking

Binge drinking is a major issue in the UK among young people, who are now drinking twice as much as they were in 1990. The Home Office confronted this trend head-on with a brief that aimed to reduce levels of binge drinking in the 18- to 24-year-old age group.

The ad's strategy is to make the audience consider their behaviour on a night out by posing the question, 'Would you do this if you were sober?'

As part of a multimedia campaign, two TV ads were created, one aimed at men, and one at women.

The former features a young man getting ready for a night out. In the process, he rips his clothes, pours takeaway food down himself and slams his head on a wardrobe door. Lina Nisbet, strategic communications adviser at the Home Office, says the aim was to show how drink can cause some men to become aggressive and violent.

In the latter ad, a young woman is shown being sick, breaking her shoes and spilling red wine. According to Nisbet, the ad questions why someone would spend so long getting ready only to undo that effort later in the evening.

'It is not about telling people not to drink. It is about drinking sensibly and not ending up in major trouble,' she says. 'It is less about finger-wagging and more about subtly highlighting the harm that can be done.'

‘These scenarios are ones that people recognise. The theme of getting ready for a night out massively juxtaposes with the feeling of "how did I get here" at the end of the night’

Lina Nisbet
Strategic Communications Adviser
Home Office

Ad info

• Home Office - 'Know your limits'
• Client: Lina Nisbet, Home Office
• Brief: cut binge drinking among 18 to 24-year-olds
• Creative agency: VCCP
• Creative team: Matt Gilbert, Dave Tokley
• Production company: Gorgeous
• Director: Vince Squibb
• Media agency: Manning Gottlieb OMD

Other ads on the podium

Persil - Roboboy

In "dirt is good", Persil has what it believes is a very strong strategic insight - but felt previous work has failed to engage consumers emotionally or explain the proposition convincingly. So this latest ad, devised by a creative team of Alex Grieve, Adrian Rossi and John O'Keeffe at Bartle Bogle Hegarty and directed by Philippe Andre, working to Aline Santos at Unilever, is a poignant vignette of a robot boy developing and evolving into a real child by engaging with the world (walking in the rain, splashing in a vast puddle) and getting dirty in the process.

Irn Bru - If

This spot, courtesy of a creative trio of Gerry Farrell, Steve Robertson and Cathy Hutton at The Leith Agency and directed by Martin Wedderburn, is a stirring, yet humorous, take on Britain's favourite (according to a BBC opinion poll) poem, "If" by Rudyard Kipling. The brief from Adrian Troy at AG Barr was to make an ad that would make its viewers "feel phenomenal" - and the film seeks to celebrate what it means to be Scottish (the pride and the emotion as well as the funnier realities), while also affirming the part played by Irn-Bru in Scottish life.

Also shortlisted for July

Guinness - Film 4 Sponsorship

These credits, created for Guinness' sponsorship of Films on 4, evoke scenarios from classic films - in one, lovers leap together into the abyss to escape pursuit; in another, a hero catches a heroine by the wrist to save her from falling into the darkness in a cliff-hanger moment. Devised by the creative team of Jonathon Cullen and Rory Hamilton at Irish International BBDO, working to Grainne Wafer at Diageo, they draw on the natural fit between the home viewing audience and the take-home trade to promote the new Guinness can. The director is Gavin Kelly.

Leonard Cheshire Disability - Love and Sex

Directed by Steve Harding-Hill at Aardman Animations, these two films morph the studio's Creature Comforts claymation style into "Creature Discomforts" in a campaign designed to dramatise the problems disabled people face in their everyday lives, while raising awareness of Leonard Cheshire Disability, the country's largest disability charity. Created by Simon Riley at Freud Communications, it shuns shock tactics, aiming instead to address prejudices and preconceptions through the sort of charm and humour that will engage people and get them talking.

MasterCard - Schools Out

This raucous and joyful evocation of summer escape from office drudgery, backed by Alice Cooper's "School's Out", is MasterCard's celebration of the official start of summer. For those with kids, it's time to hit the beach… or in this case, the hotel swimming pool. Created by Jason Stewart at McCann Erickson working to Rita Broe at MasterCard, it shows workers counting down the seconds before they're free to go on their holidays - then follows them as the bell goes and they go berserk, eventually pitching up at the airport. Knowing you've earned every second of your holiday: Priceless.

McDonalds Happy Meal - Planting

Part of McDonald's continuing strategy of evoking natural, earthy goodness, this ad shows a gang of kids tilling the land and getting their hands and knees dirty to illustrate the point that the Happy Meal menu has not only been evolving, but also contains the best quality British ingredients - notably beef, chicken and potatoes. Devised by a creative team of Chris Birch and Caroline Rawlings at Leo Burnett and directed by Tony Barry, it seeks to overcome parental reservations by reassuring mum about the food her kids eat and talking to her in an open and engaging way. The client is Jo Webster.

Müller - Milk Relay

This film shows Müller Dairy's commitment to a belief in dairy goodness - and celebrates some glorious Shropshire (where Müller is based) countryside along the way. We follow a glass of milk being passed along, by young and old (utilising just about every form of earthbound transport imaginable), from farm to dairy where it will become yoghurt - thus showing that all of Müller's milk is sourced from within 30 miles. The work was devised by James Gillham and Graham Cappi at TBWA\London for Nick White at Müller and was directed by Joe Roman.

Nokia - Navigation

This felt-tip pen epic, conjured up by a creative team of Dan Norris and Ray Shaughnessy at Wieden & Kennedy and directed by Antoine Bardou-Jacquet, has ant-like people crawling about on a vast sheet of paper, creating a map of a whole imagined world. Having launched Nokia Maps - a service that allows users to download maps of more than 200 countries to their mobiles, the ad seeks to define and own a position in the navigation space, while positioning Nokia as the category market leader. The client at Nokia is Rebecca Jones.

Trident Fresh - Mess With Your Head

The brief from Emily Richards at Cadbury was to create a metaphor for the enlivening experience of chewing Trident - and this film, created by Phillip Meyler and Darren Keff at JWT, shows Trident Fresh transporting a man from a crowded lift to a journey of refreshment. He is flown as a kite on a windy beach, is caught in the crossfire of a cops-and-robbers water pistol shoot-out and encounters a polar bear inside a freezer before falling through an ice-cube tray. He jolts back to reality and it closes with the line: "Mess with your head."