THENEWRATPACK - Strategy

OUTSTANDING
NEW
CAMPAIGNS
24 STRATEGY September 2006
By Annette Bourdeau
VESPA EMERGES FOR TIFF
The Vespa butterfl y campaign has emerged from its cocoon, with a 30-second cinema
incarnation set to hatch this month during the Toronto International Film Festival. It
builds on the wild posting campaign that broke in late spring, featuring installations of six
interpretations of the Vespa as a butterfl y by artists from around the world.
“It kind of emanated from this ‘spring has sprung’ mentality,” says Morey Chaplick,
president of Toronto-based Canadian Scooter Corporation. The spot features a dark
cocoon that bursts into a psychedelic, colourful Vespa butterfl y, set to groovy music. “We
wanted to tap into this retro feel – Vespa is an icon of the sixties,” explains Glen Hunt,
creative catalyst at Toronto-based Dentsu Canada.
Vespa is debuting the spot at TIFF to leverage its partnership with Toronto-based Tribute
Entertainment Media Group, which will have a VIP lounge during the festival where celebs
passing through will be asked to sign two Vespas to be auctioned off for charity.
Meanwhile, the spring postering efforts have been so well received, Dentsu has already
asked artists to submit work for another poster effort next spring.
“People are stealing [the posters], people are calling our offi ce asking where to get
them,” says Chaplick adding that they’ve been telling callers they can have a set of the
six posters for free if they stop by a retail location. He estimates that they’ve given away
100 sets thus far, and plans are in the works to do T-shirts and mugs with the designs, too
– for sale and for swag with Vespa purchases.
“It completely goes with our guerrilla marketing strategy,” Chaplick says. “The bottom
line is, we’d never be able to make the amount of noise we’ve been able to make using
traditional media.”
client: Morey Chaplick, president; Jeremy Logan,
VP marketing, Canadian Scooter Corporation
creative catalyst/copywriter: Glen Hunt
AD: Deborah Prenger
agency producer: Amanda Loughran
account supervisor: Aurelio DiLuciano
graphic design/post-production: Crush
CD: Gary Thomas
producer: Debbie Cooke
graphic animator: Chris Roth
senior graphic designer: Stefan Woronko
CG animator: Aylwin Fernando
music/audio production: Grayson Matthews
music producers: Dave Sorbara, Tom Westin
audio engineer: Annelise Noronha
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