MOLSON CANADIAN COLD SHOTS

Cold Shots was just a fledgling one-year-old brand when Zig was briefed to grow penetration amongst twentysomething beer drinkers.

The risk of being defined only by its size was clear – next to a big manly pint of beer, Cold Shots is diminutive, slender and feminine. Thus Zig had to find a way to communicate the brand’s uniqueness while developing a more distinctive, harder-edged brand personality. To be blunt, the advertising needed to give the brand some balls.

Cold Shots is a beer both smaller and stronger than the average brews. Thus, a unique star was born: ‘Señor Cold Shot,’ the diminutive wrestler with strength far in excess of his size. Along with TV billboard and print ads in urban weeklies, Zig took Senõr Cold Shot into bars to showcase his extraordinary prowess. This resulted in glowing feedback from the sales force, as well as retail customers.

EVERGREEN

Evergreen is a non-profit organization that supports urban greening. It needed to raise more private funding, especially for a regeneration project on the site of Toronto’s Don Valley Brickworks.

Advertising needed to prime potential supporters for fundraising calls by raising awareness of Evergreen. The organization was also competing with a wide range of fundraising tactics from charities seen to have more urgent needs. Thus, the campaign, geared at boomers, aimed to connect Evergreen’s day-to-day activities with tangible community benefits. The campaign focused on issues like increased property values, speedier patient recovery time and improved school results.

TV, print and an interactive brochure were used, as well as a series of guerrilla installations. Traffic to the Evergreen Web site rose 25% in the first three weeks of the campaign and phone inquiries increased substantially during the ad period.

IKEA

IKEA is a now an established brand in Canada famous for furnishing modern student rooms and first-time condos on a budget. But the country’s aging population forces a necessary broadening of the brand’s appeal.

There was a quandary: Zig had to position IKEA to the upcoming generation as their main destination for affordable, stylish furnishings. And, on the other hand, the shop had to challenge assumptions about IKEA as just a source for inexpensive trendy furniture for students.

Zig developed a tandem approach, delivering a strong value message while bolstering the brand’s reputation for style and quality within an overarching brand campaign: ‘IKEA Fits.’ The core message is relevance, expressed in different ways for different audiences. For the value-seeker: a powerful low-price message, championing surprisingly low prices on some of IKEA’s most popular items. And for the style and quality conscious: specific messages to debunk potential barriers and false assumptions.

Zig used ambient urban media to underscore IKEA’s value by comparing low prices on basic home essentials to purchases like a lowly hot dog. Television amplified the low price message by pushing the idea that IKEA offers low prices on products that people yearn to own. And radio was used to drive traffic to in-store events.

IKEA’s brand awareness and image measures are up, with particularly strong results against the country’s older target. Understanding of the range of IKEA’s offerings has greatly improved. And most importantly, IKEA set a new sales record for Canada, surpassing $1 billion in 2005.

W NETWORK

In 2002, Zig helped W Network jump from eighth position to the number one women’s specialty channel in Canada. But staying on top is no small feat. W’s ad budget has gotten smaller but its goal hasn’t: to get more women to watch while reinforcing its position in the trade.

Zig needed to show that no network knows women better. So female insights were at the heart of the work. Radio for the ‘Mad About Hugh’ (Grant) event, for example, tapped into the truism that no woman can resist a man with an accent. At media offices, wallet-size photos of Hugh were posted. And agencies received ‘The Essential Dictionary of Women’s English,’ suggesting women have their own language. The campaign helped increase viewership for ‘Mad About Hugh’ by 50%, according to Nielsen Media Research and the trade campaign garnered rave reviews.

MR. SUB

Mr. Sub was losing relevance. To overcome this, Zig zeroed in on two key insights: Mr. Sub’s commitment to freshness, innovation and quality had gone largely unnoticed; and consumers had a certain affinity for the brand. Zig chose to amplify Mr. Sub’s more human, irreverent personality with the ‘More Than Enough’ campaign. The launch of the campaign in March 2005 generated more customer traffic, resulting in higher sales.