General Paint needed an ad campaign to promote its product in its own retail stores as well as in large home improvement retailers, and, at the same time, promote its new Enviroguard line of paint.

A broad target market added to the challenge.

Vancouver-based General Paint’s target market is comprised mostly of single-family home owners and renovators aged between 25 and 60.

It is skewed toward females and targets the higher income segment rather than age.

Alvin Wasserman, president of Vancouver’s Wasserman & Partners, General Paint’s ad agency, and Yvonne Provencal, General Paint’s creative services manager, decided on a campaign that would have mass appeal, and, at the same time, build brand awareness.

‘If General Paint as a brand was better known and better recognized, then that would work for both our retailers and other retailers,’ Wasserman says.

‘So we took a fairly traditional brand approach, and that meant getting out some very interesting brand attributes in a dramatic and breakthrough way.’

‘And, the first attribute to get out was the sense of durability, because no one likes to paint again and again.’

In 1994, the campaign concentrated on in-store and newspaper advertising.

This year, outdoor advertising was decided upon as the primary medium, with radio playing a supporting role in Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary.

Billboards were used to promote the brand’s durability and versatility, with the radio spots using well-known historical events to talk about the product and emphasize the problems of choosing the wrong paint.

‘We didn’t just want to put up a billboard that said ‘Hey, look at this great paint,’ ‘ Provencal says.

‘We also wanted to make people aware of General Paint,’ she says.

To show durability, the 15,000-year-old cave paintings from Lascaux, France of a man among bison, horses and deer were used as the visual with the tagline ‘Lasts for Ages.’

To add some impact to the campaign and generate publicity, General Paint commissioned mural artist Paul Archer to recreate the cave paintings using the company’s new Enviroguard exterior paint.

A high traffic location was chosen at Pender and Thurlow streets in downtown Vancouver and Archer was given three days to finish the billboard. The logo went on last.

‘While we were doing this, new cave paintings were discovered, and it hit the newspapers, so it was actually newsworthy – one of those synchronization kinds of things,’ Wasserman says.

The painted billboard will stay up until the fall. All the rest of the billboards in Vancouver, Calgary and Edmonton are posters.

Public reaction to the billboards has been astounding, with many people making requests to get copies.

‘For every consumer that gets through to the advertising manager, there are another five calls behind that don’t,’ Provencal says.

In response, the company launched a ‘Lasts for Ages’ line of T-shirts, hats and posters.

A local school board has asked to use the campaign in its curriculum to show students how ancient history can be used in modern-day advertising.

Says Wasserman: ‘As soon as we did it, we knew it was right, and we wondered why anyone else hadn’t done this kind of thing.’

While the outdoor advertising campaign kicked off April 5, radio spots began airing last November.

The radio element of the campaign used three well-known historical events to talk about the product.

Using seafaring music in the background and the voice of blues rocker Long John Baldry, the last in the series reads:

‘The Santa Maria was Christopher Columbus’ flagship. A mighty vessel for its time. In 1492, it led a brave flotilla in search of a new route from Europe to Asia. The Santa Maria was shipwrecked in the West Indies. Historians are unsure why she perished, but, this much is certain: it was not painted with General Paint. Something worth thinking about when you’re considering which paint to use on your deck. Remember, the experts ask specifically for General Paint.’

The other two radio spots are similar, but use the Great Wall of China and the fabled underwater island of Atlantis as examples of what can happen when the wrong paint is used.

The campaign is results-oriented and store sales will be used to gauge success.

‘It’s nice that in the paint area there is not a big tradition of actually advertising it this way or that way so there are no big footsteps to follow and you can do your own thing,’ Wasserman says.

‘The client was willing to step out and be noticed and that’s really important and quite courageous.’