beverages

Coke's Powerade Backs FIFA Championships

Powerade/FIFA

Coca-Cola's Powerade brand is sponsoring the FIFA World Cup soccer championships. The games are being played in several cities in South Africa, and ESPN will cover them. 

The integrated global campaign includes interactive videos where consumers get to shape the narrative of a series of community and amateur football matches filmed in different countries. The effort, via the agency SapientNitro, will launch in 20 markets including Europe, Latin America and the United States.

The campaign is housed at a new FIFA-themed microsite at YouTube/ Powerade and has an interactive component that lets viewers stop the film and click on a ribbon running along the bottom of the screen to do a deep dive on certain players in the films. Some film frames allow access, virtually, into the bodies and thoughts of the players.

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The HD film, "The Never Ending Game" is a sort of soccer-themed global travelogue shot at ground level as if the camera is in the game.

It starts with a game in an African village with young men playing football in the street. The camera zooms in on players' faces as the sun beats down, and one of them grabs a Powerade and drinks. Another uses the pause to score a goal. Then the game shifts to athletic fields, yards, lots, and beaches in an assortment of countries.

Clickable areas let viewers look inside the "psyche" of each player. Lest Powerade be forgotten in the excitement of the moment, some of the clickable elements offer a tutorial in gross anatomy and vascular physiology.

One sequence, for example, purports to follow a bead of sweat from its origins in the body "demonstrating its purpose in terms of organ function, nutrient delivery, etc.," per the company. When the sweat slowly drips off a player's hand, vital nutrient loss is demonstrated and tips for Powerade nutrient replenishment will be provided.

Powerade will promote the site with banners and seeded viral videos, as well as a TV spot that is basically an abbreviated version of the video on YouTube.com/Powerade with visuals panning from country to country, to games being played day and night on urban pavements, or grass, or in puddles on parking lots in front of graffiti-festooned walls.

"Powerade, Keep Playing" is the tag, with a shot of a Powerade bottle whose label says "Chosen by FIFA to Hydrate."

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