What did you do for International Cat Day? Honda took to social media to debut an adorable catvertisment as part of its songful summer clearance campaign titled "Now is the Moment." In "Meow is the Moment," cats play the role of humans in a Honda showroom. One cat is looking for a new car while salescat offers assistance. An all-cat choir begins to meow the popular The Go-Gos hit, "Head Over Heels," marking the moment the cat fell in love with a 2016 Honda CR-V. Five GIFs and five memes will also support the video, running on Honda's Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and Tumblr pages. RPA created the campaign, directed by Jared Eberhardt.
Olympian Shakur Stevenson is the latest athlete to be featured in Powerade's ongoing "Just A Kid" campaign. The boxer grew up in Newark, NJ and draws from his rough upbringing when things get tough in the ring. "The Corner" is a 2-minute video that begins with Stevenson receiving a pep talk from his coach. He's in the midst of a fight and needs motivation. After surviving the first round, Stevenson receives another pep talk. This time, he zones out and relives an important moment from his youth: confronting a bully. The bully took Stevenson's hat, taunting him that he wouldn't do anything about it. The Olympian did, following the bully and punching him. That doesn't mean a young Stevenson got off easy. A look at Stevenson returning home to his mother with a bloody nose is juxtaposed with Stevenson bleeding in the ring. Both times, Stevenson hears his mother telling him to keep fighting. And so he does. "We're all just a kid from somewhere," closes the video, by Wieden+Kennedy Portland.
Why stress about a zombie apocalypse when there's a better chance robots will take over the word first? Halfpops, maker of a crunchy half-popped popcorn, is targeting coders with its first national campaign, dubbed the "Halfpocalypse Challenge." Anyone with ninja-esque coding skills will be mailed a month's supply of Halfpops, if they can prove their knowledge of writing code on the Halfpops site. To successfully receive the goods, coders must sign the "Halfpocalypse Agreement," promising to protect Halfpop's employees when the robots take over. In an amusing three-minute video, viewers follow a Halfpops spokesperson as he scales a mountaintop in an attempt to flee the robots. In between, he explains the company will keep coding experts fed as long as they talk nice to the robots overtaking Earth. The video ends with the spokesman beating a drone senseless, believing the robots are following him. In reality, it was a father and son flying their now-junk metal drone. The company is also promoting the campaign with a binary hashtag, #0110100001100001011011000110011001110000011011110111000001110011. Humanaut created the campaign.
It's no "Game of Thrones," but this Infiniti Q60 ad starring Kit Harington might tide fans over until next season. In his first work for the brand, Harington recites a William Blake classic, "The Tyger," as he takes a red Q60 for a spin. The actor is just as intense in a car commercial as he is when he's playing Jon Snow in the hit HBO show. "What will you feel?" asks the ad as Harington enters the car. Once driving, he starts out quietly reciting the poem. As he drives faster, his intensity rises until he comes to a sudden halt and slowly takes his hands off the steering wheel. CP+B LA created the campaign.
Capitalizing on the Pokémon GO craze, the Colorado Lottery placed a 3-D cube art installation at a PokéStop in Denver's Confluence Park. The blue six-foot-tall cube looks exactly like its digital counterpart within the mobile game. Visitors can see the cube from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., located on the lawn at the corner of the bike path between Cherry Creek and the bridge to REI. The goal of the campaign is to remind people that proceeds from the Colorado Lottery are invested to protect Colorado's wilderness and create trails, parks, pools and recreation. Or, it's a sign of the apocalypse. Cactus created the installation. See it here, here and here.
Hennessy launched "The Piccards," the fourth video from the brand's Wild Rabbit campaign. The video brings to life Hennessy's "Never stop. Never settle" motto by telling the story of a father and son who made huge discoveries above and below earth. In 1931, a Swiss physicist named Auguste Piccard became the first man to reach the stratosphere. In 1960, his son Jacques became the first to reach the deepest bottom of the ocean. The 90-second video feels more like a movie than a commercial. We begin with the elder Piccard reaching the earth's stratosphere and reveling in its beauty. Viewers are quickly brought below ground, watching the younger Piccard reach ocean depths never imagined. I bet a doctor in that family would come across as a "disappointment." Droga5 created the campaign, directed by Daniel Wolfe of Somesuch.Co.
The Google Calendar app launched "Goals" as a way to help users find time to do things that typically fall by the wayside. It could be calling home or finding the time to go running. The app wants to position itself as a personal assistant of sorts that keeps track of our goals and helps us find time to dedicate to them. An 80-second video, created by B-Reel, introduces viewers to Brad, a busy, sweet guy who was dumped by his boyfriend. Mending his broken heart, Brad turns to yoga, using Goals in his Google Calendar to help find time to commit to his practice. Even when life gets in the way, Goals can be deferred and moved around throughout the day. The spot ends with Brad meeting a cute new sales rep from Spain. His new goal? Learn Spanish.
Lockheed Martin launched Generation Beyond, a national educational program to bring the science of space into thousands of classrooms. One interesting aspect of the program is the Mars Experience Bus. Windows of an ordinary school bus were morphed to take kids on a tour of the Martian surface. The bus will travel the country, providing students with a unique riding experience: the virtual reality vehicle replicates 200 square miles of the Martian surface. When the bus turns, the landscape turns just as it would in any bus ride. McCann and Framestore created the campaign.
Random iPhone App of the week: Realtors will enjoy a set of emojis created solely for them, thanks to the California Association of Realtors. Created by RTO+P, the free CARmojis app was created to add a bit pizazz to home buying and selling text conversations. The emojis range from "sold" signs, fireplaces, realtors wearing superhero capes, refrigerators and other wish-list items, to signing mortgages, champagne and house keys.