A young man croons to the camera: ‘Where do they go? After all these years of plunging, oh you got to answer me. Where do they go-oooh?’ He’s wondering where all those people wind up after they toss back a Nestea beverage and fall backwards into the small pool that magically appears behind them.
The character stars in two new commercials in which he witnesses people taking the Nestea plunge and then disappear. Both are very similar, but with different endings, and in each, the viewer sees what the main subject doesn’t. In one ad, the plunger comes face to face with a beautiful mermaid (think Daryl Hannah in Splash), while in the second he finds himself trapped inside a bottle of Nestea. The tagline is ‘nothing refreshes like Nestea.’
Says David Thomson, director of marketing for non-carbonated beverages at Toronto-based Coca-Cola Canada: ‘the plunge’ has been mnemonic for the brand for over 20 years. We wanted to drive home the message of total body refreshment, but twist ‘the plunge’ on its ear.’
That was the objective put forth to Toronto ad agency Lowe Roche. Since ‘the plunge’ is iconic, the creatives had the freedom to play with it, explains Trent Fulton, VP business management at Lowe. ‘Most of the other spots end at ‘the plunge,’ so we wondered what really happened. That was a real light bulb going off.’
Fulton says marketers often make the mistake of walking away from a mnemonic device too early, because they get bored before the consumer does. ‘People were very familiar with ‘the plunge,’ and they were getting the message. If you find interesting ways to keep [the device] fresh, it will continue to resonate.’
The ads are geared at the 18-to-34 target, however since Nestea appeals broadly, they also couldn’t push the mettle too much. Thomson says there’s also an opportunity to add more spots with alternate endings in the future.
Client: Coca-Cola
Agency: Lowe Roche
Creative director: Geoffrey Roche
Associate creative director: Simon Tuplin
Senior copywriter: Allen Oke
VP business management: Trent Fulton
Director: The Perlorian Brothers
Production house: Reginald Pike
Producer: Ken Rodger
Music: Grayson Matthews
