Mullen, American Greetings Go For Another Viral Hit With 'Dad Casting'
- by Steve McClellan @mp_mcclellan, June 3, 2014
Last month Mullen unveiled the “#worldstoughestjob” Mother’s Day campaign for client card company American Greetings that was sort of a Candid Camera meets Craigslist approach. The agency posted an online help wanted listing for a “director of operations” position and then recorded the responses of candidates as they listened to the requirements during an online interview.
Unbeknownst to the candidates, the listing was for the job of Mom and included requirements such as standing up most the time, no time to sleep and no vacations. Oh, and no salary either. Lunch break? Sometimes, maybe.
The upshot? The video became a huge viral hit -- to date it has been seen more than 20.6 million times.
Now the agency and client have teamed up to try to capture lightning in a bottle one more time with a Father’s Day sequel called “Dad Casting.”
The structure of the video is a “casting call” for the role of dad. The actors don’t know it has anything to do with American Greetings.
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According to the agency the creative premise is that “fatherhood is full of unscripted moments.” The goal is to generate appreciation for dads and their parenting, a job that, like the role of moms, is tougher than it looks.
Consumers can participate in the conversation by tweeting unscripted dad moments and explaining why the dad in their life deserves a standing ovation.
Every #worldstoughestjob hashtagged card, tweet and post about dad is tallied up by a “Dadmiration Tracker” and displayed on a blog landing page. The “Dad Casting” video can be seen here. And here are the credits:
Project Title: Dad Casting
Client: Cardstore from American Greetings
Executive Director, Marketing: Alex Ho
Vice President, Marketing: Christy Kaprosy
Agency: Mullen
Chief Creative Officer: Mark Wenneker
Executive Creative Director: Tim Vaccarino
Executive Creative Director: Dave Weist
Creative Director: Jon Ruby
Copywriter: Latasha Ewell
Art Director: Sarah Dudek
Executive Director of Integrated Production: Liza Near
Head of Broadcast: Zeke Bowman
Producer: Vera Everson
Production Company: Hungry Man
Director: Hank Perlman
Executive Producer: Kevin Byrne
Producer: Joshua Greenberg
DP: Eric Steelberg
Editorial: PS260
Editor: JJ Lask
Assistant Editor: Colin Edelman
Senior Producer: Laura Lamb Patterson
Color Correct/Finishing: PS260
Colorist: Michael Marciano
Audio Post: Plush NYC
Sound Design/Mixer: Rob Fielack
Music: Human
I checked out the video & all I could think was: "Is the only role that dad plays is the boundary maker?"
Did no on this team have a dad who taught them thinks (teacher)? Nurture their dreams (coach or audience)? How about fun guy to hang out with (playground)? Story-teller (campfire)?
I realize the last 10 seconds show a few soft moments of "I love you" but given the 2 preceding minutes preceding were all dad= cop the video's message really boiled down to: "Dad's, they are emotionally stunted people, but they do love you."
Yes, my dad was the rule-enforcer but he was so much more and this video really gives him & all dad's short-change for all the other things Dad's do beyond enforcing rules...
Yet again, fathers are portrayed as lazy, selfish, idiotic buffoons. Thank SO MUCH for honoring what we do in your new campaign. "Viral hit" my ass.
I think the point is that, if you script it, dads come off as typecast policemen. But, if you let it be real, there is much more to it. I don't think it's necessarily a home run (kinda sappy), but it doesn't insult dads either.