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Holiday

Dailey Plays Reindeer Games for the Holiday Headbanger

More like a head-scratcher. With Christmas less than a week away, L.A.-based Dailey, no strangers to the silly of course, decided to ramp up the festivities by promoting their new speed-metal band… Sleigher. No word yet on the inevitable copyright infringement lawsuit.

Sleigher seems to be the brainchild of a few guys who had way too much eggnog and decided to create characters like Klaüs Von Kringle. Judging by the videos on the HTML 1.0 Sleigher website, the band is a mixture of a holiday joke gone way overboard and a borderline white supremacist fantasy. Apparently, per the press release, Sleigher demo CDs were very popular in Dailey’s lobby, and “inquiries have been made about their availability for other holiday parties.”

I hope this is a joke, but unfortunately, I’m not sure. Either way, Bah! Humbug!

And Now, Your Unicorn-Led Midday Break, Courtesy of LBi

We’re not sure what LBi is trying to convey here, but we do agree that regardless of the situation, there’s no way a 10-speed bike measures up to an almighty unicorn on the open market. That’s the holiday message we gather from this clip created by the now-Publicis Groupe-owned agency. Unfortunately, U.K. trade Marketing brings us crashing down to earth by claiming this little ditty was made as a result of LBi winning its Digital Agency of the Year honors, though it appears like just another holiday entry to us. Whatever, tomato,  tomahto.

Speaking of LBi, last week, we were inundated with tips regarding the agency’s relationship with MRY, formerly Mr. Youth, which was acquired by the former over a year ago. From what we’ve been hearing, come new year, LBi and MRY are to merge into a new operation to be led by the former’s CCO Cedric DeVitt and the latter’s CEO, Matt Britton. According to spies, the new mantra for the new operation is “making remarkable things” or something to that effect. Of course, when we reached the LBi camp, we were told that there was “nothing new to report.” Perhaps there will be, though, when everyone returns from the holidays. We’ll keep you posted.

Gotham is Here to Offer Gift Ideas on the Fast and Cheap

Try as we may, but we can’t really avoid the deluge of holiday contributions, but we can surely ignore them…unless they catch our eye, of course, like this entry from IPG-owned, NYC-based agency, Gotham. For those of you bereft of gift ideas who are carrying nothing but tattered old business cards and lint in your wallets/purses, Gotham has some creative, quickfire solutions to help you out this time of year.

With a little ingenuity, you can make the most out of useless items, supplies and other office knick-knacks to come up with a seasonal gift for next to nothing. For instance, the clip above shows you how directors reels that are collecting dust can be turned into wreaths that will appeal to those celebrating Christmas or Hanukkah. Or, there’s the “popcorn ball snowman” that’ll come to life with the help of a Snickers bar and a few pencils. Sure, these gifts will prove that you’re a cheap bastard, but at least you can show off your craftiness from the comfort of your desk at the office. Check out more of Gotham’s holiday handiwork here.

And Now, Your Afternoon Holiday Card Inundation (Including One NSFW Language Item)

As expected, the floodgates have opened this week, and with the usual dearth of normal Spy material this time of year (though we have a few things brewing this week, don’t worry), we’ll fill you in with a smattering of what we’ve received just today alone in terms of agency holiday efforts. We shall begin this post with a little lump of coal in stocking (and our favorite holiday entry thus far) provided by the folks at Toronto agency Zulu Alpha Kilo, who offer their mean-spirited, but pretty amusing take on “Twas the Night Before Christmas.” The narrative aspect is the only thing that ties this clip to the original holiday classic, which has now been transformed into a tale about deadlines . We really needn’t explain further. Just perhaps wear headphones if you’re at work.

Not sure how follow that up, but above, please take a gander if you will at the demo for San Francisco-based EVB’s entry dubbed “Holify It!,” a bookmarklet app that takes its cues from YouTube’s music-synchronized house-lighting videos, to get in the holiday spirit. We tried it on various bookmarks and though we’re treated to the same choral rendition of “Carol of the Bells” each time, it’s fun to watch your fave sites dance via light show for a minute.

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Pharma Agency Takes Kindness to the ‘Extreme’..and a ‘Worst Holiday Card’ Contender Emerges?

Hmm, has MRM’s 2010 holiday card (now since removed, unfortunately) finally met its match? Seeing as that buried under all this monster truck rally promo-style silliness is the theme of kindness, it’s hard to bust Chicago-based Closer Look’s balls, though we really do miss those last three minutes of our lives. All we can gauge is that Closer Look, which focuses on pharma digital marketing, offers both transportation accommodation and a rather unique food delivery method (can we get the 2-for-1 package?).

The tipster who sent this clip to us opines that it’s “…So awful I can’t tell if it becomes a cult classic at some point. Right up there with the Sapient recruiting video.” Ouch. Consider the gauntlet thrown.

Here’s VML’s Holiday Card, ‘Reindeer Races’

This comes from VML Australia. It is comforting to know that they celebrate the holidays in a country/continent that (I’ve learned, thanks to Reddit) is populated by the scariest bugs and weirdest animals in the entire world.

For those who need another reason to gamble and shake their phone really hard, this effort from the WPP digital agency’s Sydney office that’s being described as a “real-world interactive race between four of Santa’s reindeer”  might be the game for you. For the rest of you, I hope this can provide even the most fleeting smile on a really heartbreaking day.

So, This is Happening: Cleveland Agency Staffers Will Get Dunked in Egg Nog for Good Cause

The agency holiday blitz continues with this effort from Cleveland-based agency Marcus Thomas, which decided to send a bunch of its staffers to the dunk tank, which just so happens to be filled with egg nog. How appropriate. But why are they doing this exactly? Well, besides getting into the holiday spirit by possibly making asses of themselves, the Marcus Thomas crew is also trying to help out the United Way of Cleveland. The effort, which lives online here, has been going on since Monday (it ends today) and lets visitors, between 3-5pm EST, login, get in the queue and hopefully get to use their mouse to shoot softballs from the comfort of their desk and dunk a random MT staffer. Each successful hit earns $50 for the United Way, so at least there’s something fulfilling about this silly effort

The dizzying clip above features footage from the headcams of Wednesday’s dunkees. The top vote-getter as of today, is copywriter TJ Prochaska, who pleads his case in the clip above. If you don’t mind getting dizzy, meanwhile, here’s some headcam footage below that’s brought to us by Wednesday’s dunkees.

BSSP’s Holiday Entry: A Twitter Troll-Burning ‘Cruel Log’

Yes folks, as the year winds down, this is going to be mostly what we’ll see as 2012 runs its course. This latest entry for the holiday season comes from Sausalito, CA’s own Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners, which has decided to hand it back to those throwing lumps of coals in stockings via Twitter with an online entry dubbed the “Cruel Log.” Yep, Twitter “stooges” will get the fiery treatment and we feel something like this won’t be the end of holiday-related agency work inspired by the microblogging service. Happy holidays!

Carrot Creative Continues Work with Farmigo, This Time Featuring Singing GIFs

Less than three weeks after we first mentioned Brooklyn-based Carrot Creative’s partnership with online organic marketplace Farmigo, the agency has returned to warm the cockles this holiday season a new collaborative effort dubbed “The 12 Days of GIFing.” Launched yesterday and running through 12 days, natch, the campaign is part Christmas carol, part gifting for the Food Bank of New York, which will receive proceeds in the form of food provided by New York-area farmers.

Carrot CEO Mike Germano tells us, “”The goal of our card this year is to spread cheer to our friends and fans while helping out our fellow NYers, who need extra attention now more than ever. Through our existing relationship with Farmigo, we’ve created a way for people to donate fresh food from local farmers to those who are hungry this Holiday season, and for the next 12 months. As a social agency, we’re all about community; this Holiday, we hope you’ll help us support ours.”

The main draw of the campaign, though, appears to be the the GIFs on the site itself, which will activate some tunes via a simple mouseover. It can be annoying, distracting, etc., but at least your karma points will rise.

Yoke’s Ad-vent Calendar Brings Commercial Cheer

Australia studio Yoke recently launched it’s holiday-themed Ad-vent Calendar for the 25 days leading up to Christmas. Each day, Yoke reveals one creative ad from the past that may not be well-known to large audiences. Thus far, the curated collection includes spots for companies like Peugeot and Nolan’s Cheddar Cheese, and to totally honest, some of these ads will probably be better gifts than whatever I get from my family.

Below is the Nolan’s Cheddar spot. Don’t know how much they paid for the rights to use Jim Morrison‘s voice and Rocky theme music in the same commercial, but the money is well spent. It’s hard to make viewers empathize with rodents, but they may have found a willing co-star for the next Rocky sequel.

Today’s posted ad is a Peugeot 206 commercial from India, definitely worth a look. I must’ve missed out on the Peugeots-are-symbols-of-cool bandwagon, but the ad has a worthy narrative for the Ad-vent Calendar. Who doesn’t love the signature Indian guy head-bob?

With 13 days to go, this is a page you’ll want to bookmark for a nice reprieve from the monotony of primetime TV ads. Unless you like the T-Mobile Girl, in which case, you’ll most likely end up with coal in your stocking.

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