P!nk is the new face of V8 Supercars Australia in major campaign blitz via GPY&R Sydney
V8 Supercars Australia has proven its credentials as “The Greatest Show on Wheels” by securing international music sensation P!nk as the sport’s ambassador from 2010 through to 2012. The announcement was made at the annual Season Launch tonight, held at Stage 3, Fox Studios, where the crème de la crème of the motor sport, media and entertainment world gathered together to be the first to see the brand new commercial starring the feisty American rocker.
The commercial, created by Tim Arrowsmith and Dean Mortensen (pictured below between takes) via agency GPY&R Sydney, was shot by top USmusic video director Dave Meyers via @radical.media in Sydney duringP!nk’s 2009 Funhouse Tour, and airs on national television from 6amtomorrow – Thursday 11 February – showcasing P!nk with an all star castof V8 Supercars drivers including Jamie Whincup, Will Davison, RickKelly, Mark Winterbottom, Fabian Coulthard and James Courtney.
In his ten-year directing career, Meyers has won a host of awards andworked with some of the industry’s biggest stars including P!nk, JLo,Aerosmith, Janet Jackson, Jay-Z and Britney Spears.
Says V8 Supercars Australia chairman Tony Cochrane: “This is also the biggest campaign, by a long, long way, that V8 Supercars has embarked on and let me tell you we’ve done some big things in our history. It is an enormous coup for our sport to have P!nk as an ambassador for the next three years and we are very proud to have her on board.
“V8 Supercars is about growth and growing our audiences. We have proven in a relatively short amount of time that V8 Supercars is a world class product on and off the track. Again with this announcement we are setting a very high benchmark.
“So why P!nk? She’s the greatest female artist on the planet in my books. She’s not afraid to be different. She’s bold, she’s outspoken and she’s unapologetic. She’s the most popular modern day artist in this country by a very long margin. She’s cool! For all of those reasons V8 Supercars and P!nk are the perfect DNA match.”
45 Comments
Well done Tim and Dean.. it’s big and fun. And Pink is hot.
Irrelevant and borrowed fame. What a load of crap!
Terribly shot.
Terrible edit.
Terrible idea.
Terrible and obvious strategy.
less that it’s…
This will work Pinks tits off!
Big, bold bugger off.
Won’t win any awards but I don’t think it was designed to.
NRL, ARU etc are also probably sitting up and taking notice this morning. That sport is going off.
WTF?
It’s ok.
Considering what they had to work with it could have been better, high budget, good graphics etc.
Maybe not giving P!nk so many lines and just sticking to waving the checkered flag in a midriff.
Grotesque.
Tim, what would Bruce think of you working with Pink!?
Why is Australia so obsessed with Pink?
Cool that big bus thing transforms and look there is Pink!, a midget wearing goggles; great, so why would I want to watch the V8’s now?
Baffurst.
5:04 AM You’re just feeling bad because you didn’t have all those toys and budget to work with. Not a great ad, but it has great presence…and perfect for the market
A lot of money for not a lot happening. Think they should have done without Pink and written a script around Transformers. That’s the only bit that looked great.
I must say, using Pink just because she’s the most popular artist in Australia isn’t a very good link with V8s.
So if Australia’s most popular artist happened to be Casey Donovan, they’d have used her in the Pink role instead? I think not.
awkward
Well done.
This ad will no doubt horrify all those blokes out there in adland that comment on this blog and love V8s. But suck it up guys – this ad clearly isn’t targeted at you – they’re targeting chicks. Derr! So critique the creative all you like – but I think the strategy on this one is first class.
Agree it won’t win awards – but somehow I think here they’re chasing gate sales, not gongs. And somehow with this I think they might get it.
Not sure if anyone who has commented so far has ever left the eastern suburbs/LNS.
Put yourselves in the shoes of the average petrol-head bogan who likes nothing more than swilling Jim Beam RTDs and setting fire to couches on Mount Panorama and the ad becomes relevant and engaging.
The ad should do the required job.
Isn’t that our job? Or is avoiding the ire of our peers more important?
Cringe worthy
I just threw up in my mouth a little.
10.48 am
You believe those are expensive toys? Made in China maybe.
It’s a decent ad – except the end with the waving hands, that’s just poo.
Is she going to be playing at events? I assume not.
I wonder if petrol heads would rather see pink or Acca Dacca as ambassador to their sport? I thought only 13 year old girls love pink.
I think the debate about the link between Pink and Supercars is pretty erroneous. I imagine that she’ll really hit a chord with the punters. I figure most guys/girls would find her hot and has a kind of petrol/hard edged vibe that surrounds her.
The same could be said about the idea. It should and will work it’s pants off.
But what I find weird is with so many names and sense of hype attached, that the final piece feels awkward, clumsy and somewhat disconnected.
Pink really looks really uncomfortable in many of the takes. Ditto the drivers featured. They all look flat and like they’re doing it by numbers. The moments within the story and the characters don’t feel at all connected. It feels like all of the characters have been thrown into a very loose and unstructured narrative then tried to be pieced together in the edit.
Ignoring the content and personal taste a spot like this should have really been a showcase piece for its genre but sadly it has no rhythm or energy so therefore just feels awkward?
Won’t trouble any juries, but who the hell cares! It’s big, bold, fun, brassy and full of adjectives! I reckon it’ll go gangbusters with the people they’re after!!!!!!!!! I need a few more exclamation marks!!!!!!!! AHHHHH!!!!!!
And what an awesomely fun shoot to be on… sure I’d love to win a couple of cannes gold, but in between wouldn’t it be great to be involved in this stuff too?
Bloody little rippa
Ouch.
Definitely think the idea of using Pink to promote a bevan sport is spot on. The NRL used Tina Turner to great effect years ago. However this execution is bloody tragic.
The gap between Patts Melb & Patts SYdney could not be wider than the 2 examples of their work this week.
Picnic has Melb sitting on the years best modern idea, Pink has Sydney with a big job in front of them.
I wonder how they will finish the year with the new CD?
Good luck Julian, Syd Patts needs to be up there with the big brother.
Good fit for the mainstream bogan market judging by the amount of airplay she gets on mainstream bogan radio.
Given the target audience, I think there was a real missed opportunity here. This one: Race Day, Bathurst… We open on a belligerent, bourbon-fuelled spectator up on the hill as he reaches around with a gun-style BBQ lighter to ignite the mother of all farts. (SFX: blowtorch) Then, true to current crowd-sourcing formula, he is unexpectedly propelled into the race right alongside his heroes on a high-octane ride down Conrod Straight before taking the chequered flag and being crowned the undisputed 2010 V8 Gas God. And the fun needn’t stop there. At home, he can visit the website to experience the interactive game version of the TVC before uploading his very best party-fart flame pics to be judged by a panel of notable experts. And the price tag for all of this feel-good integration and consumer engagement? A hell of a lot less than 2 to 5 mill, that’s for sure. If you’re going to make a monstrous warm fart of an ad, you might as well do it for real.
The creatives look suitably bored.
Well, they have just made a spot with a 1993 strategy.
After the disastrous GPY&R campaign with Dustin Hoffman you would have thought they’d have learnt not to just plonk a celeb into a spot in place of an idea…
I can see the meeting.. “Pink, Transformers. How could it possibly fail?”
In fact I’m a middle aged north shore mum. I think it’s great… and so do my kids.
2.50pm – I think you’re being a bit too anal about this…
Great ad for Pink.
Wow. Tim & Dean you’re both great, inspirational guys, and I do like what you’ve done with this.
But if you gave me half the money you spent on the spot I would have door knocked all through Parramatta for you guys and given half to charity!
So damn expensive, my mind boggles.
I can’t work out if I hate you or love you after this :o)
Wow. As an absolute motorsport fanatic, taxi racing tragic, with a bunch of bogan mates who love the V8s as much as I do, rest assured this is going to tank fast and hard.
Bogan WOMEN love Pink, not their husbands/boyfriends. So unless they’re trying to open up their target market, they’e got no hope. And bogan women already like racing, non-bogan women don’t, and don’t like pink.
Lowest common denominator music couple ain’t going to sell V8s to anyone.
I didn’t know that V8 Supercar fans liked Pink. Maybe they can do some radio on 2Day FM to go with the campaign.
8.44 check the facts.
It is already Australia’s fastest growing sport, so a little more niche’ than “bogan”.
And Pink outsold any other touring act in Australia’s recent history – probably also making her slightly more niche’ than bogan.
And yes they are trying to open up their target market – it says it in the press release.
TAXI.
horribly shot, what a wasted opportunity
It’s Billy Idol stomping around on biker speed trying to talent direct a stubbornly sober cast in a bad remake of Mad Max II.
In the words of the greatest hater of all time; Silky Johnston “What can I say about this ad that hasn’t already been said about Afghanistan, It looks bombed out and depleted!”
Midgets? Carrots? Pink? And THIS is ALL you come back with?
After such a substantial personal investment I’m… well, disappointed.
GUARDS!! Introduce our little agency friends to… ‘Goran.’
FACT: 95% of Australians are bogans
FACT: Less than 0.1% of Australians are advertising creatives
Do the maths, and know your target audience.
(Here’s a hint: it’s not thye wankers on this blog)
I would love to see Meyer’s 3 minute cut, then it might make sense
1:13… Maybe you’re right. We critical creatives should “do the maths”;
but perhaps first YOU should do the English: “thye wanker…”
Pink is the new brown.
2.10 obviously doesn’t have an iphone.
Very professional, one of the best ads from 2010.
Great job by Dean Mortensen and Tim Arrowsmith.