The Spot: Dairy Queen
Tim Nudd
Salma Hayek stars in a new bilingual 'Got Milk?' campaign that covers its demographic bases while transcending them.
IDEA: MilkPEP's "Got milk?" campaign has had great success over the years telling moms that milk is nutritious and should be an essential part of their children's diet. Deutsch felt it was time to expand beyond a demographic focus to an occasion based approach, based around the natural times of day to drink milk — beginning with the first meal of the day. "Breakfast is the most significant and ritualized occasion for consuming milk," said Greg DiNoto, chief creative officer at Deutsch. "It became a natural platform for this effort." And while the work is meant to transcend demographics, it does have a notable Hispanic angle — it stars the Mexican-American actress Salma Hayek and is running in English and Spanish on TV, in print and online.
TALENT: Hayek, 45, was perfect for the role, DiNoto said. "First, she's a great comedic actress with incredible timing and the ability to pop through the screen in key moments," he said. "Second, she's accessible. Despite [her] being incredibly beautiful, people feel she's real and could be a proxy for them as moms. And she's kind of spicy and fun, and she's got a magnetism that transcends a straightup comedic approach." As a Latino actress whose appeal extends beyond Latinos, Hayek helps the campaign cover its demographic bases without being about demographics. "It allows us to have one foot in the camp that believes there is no such thing as a true general market and a discrete Latino market, and one foot in the camp that says there do, in fact, exist two separate, discernible markets," said DiNoto. "That's the beauty of this effort. Salma Hayek creates a very specific kind of signifier for Latinos. But had there not been any mandate to speak specifically to the Hispanic market, we still would have cast her in this role, for her comedic talents and her acting ability." A girl appears with Hayek in the campaign (an actress, not Hayek's real-life daughter).
COPYWRITING: In the 60-second launch spot, Hayek arrives home from a fancy night out to realize she has no milk for the morning. So, she sets out on a wild goose chase to find some. All the stores are either out of milk or closed. Eventually, after thinking better of milking a cow herself, she flags down a milk truck in the early morning and gets her precious gallon. The agency looked at 10 or 11 concepts, but this one stood out. "It explains that an empty refrigerator at night should be a challenge to you," said DiNoto. "It takes the 'Got milk?' imperative and makes it, specifically, 'Got milk for the morning?' It puts a finer point on what 'Got milk?' means overall."
ART DIRECTION/FILMING: Director Wally Pfister filmed the spot in and around Los Angeles over a couple of days in January. It has a range of looks, from the harsh glare of the convenience store to the ghostly pre-dawn cow pasture to the warm glow of the kitchen at breakfast time. Hayek grows increasingly disheveled, her hair eventually becoming a giant tangled mane.
SOUND: The soundtrack is a mix of mambo and surf guitar. "We wanted to cue the farcical nature of the goings-on but not be too cartoony," said DiNoto. "There's an air of sophistication that's communicated with the combination of these two genres."
MEDIA: National broadcast and cable. A second spot shows Hayek daydreaming about drinking milk at breakfast as a girl. She also stars in a milk-mustache print ad. The campaign is online at TheBreakfastProject.com and will I meexpand in the future. Said DiNoto: "It won't be limited to breakfast, but breakfast will be at the heart of it."
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