LET’S GET VERTICAL

Look up. Look wa-a-ay up, to the ski hill that’s taller than the Empire State Building, with a base of natural snow almost as high as a giraffe.

The latest TV campaign for Newfoundland ski resort Marble Mountain, which includes five 15-second spots, plays up the mountain’s substantial stature with height-related images like the aforementioned monument and giraffe. Another execution features a polar bear flattening itself out on some ice, with a voiceover proclaiming: ‘Once you’ve skied Marble, everything else seems a little flat.’

‘We were searching out what’s weird and wonderful and quirky,’ explains Tom Murphy, CD at St. John’s-based agency Target. The client didn’t have a large budget to work with, so the creative team poured through stock footage to find entertaining clips that could work with the campaign’s tagline, ‘Vertically Inclined.’

The goal is to position Marble Mountain as a vacation spot that competes with Quebec’s ski hills, as opposed to a local desination, says Murphy, adding that most of the resort’s past efforts have been quite tactical, concentrating mostly on retail partnerships and brochures, while this campaign is more image-focused. ‘We wanted to step away from the past and start building a brand.’

The spots are running in Newfoundland and Nova Scotia.

client: Anne Pinsent, GM, Marble Mountain Ski Resort

CD: Tom Murphy

creative group head: Brian Sheppard

copywriters: Kurt Mills, Terri Roberts, Brian Sheppard

ADs: Tom Murphy, Matthew Perrier

account executives: Mark Peters, Catherine Kelly, Cindy Hall

agency producer: Heikki Kuld

prodco: Flashcut

editor: Brenton McConnell

sound design: Eric Harry Music

recording studio: Notch

special effects: Kristi Anne Webster