The biggest European account win of last year was The&Partnership landing £200m or so Toyota Europe creative and media to add to its Lexus business, no mean task for an agency – dubbed Team Toyota – that needed to set up a European network from scratch.
Seems to be hitting its stride though with two campaigns, both for Lexus. The first is a tie up with Time Out to show how you can visit four days in four days economically with a Lexus “entry level” hybrid – ‘say yes to the city.’
Running footage as they say, but an ingenious wheeze from T&P’s CHI&Partners and media agency m/SIX.
More running footage but rather more ambitious in creative terms is this – ‘the art of standing out’ – also from CHI enlisting various famous works of art in the cause.
Of the latter CHI ECD Micky Tudor says: “As Lexus is famed for its exquisite design credentials, we felt it would be fitting to pay homage to some of the world’s greatest works of art in this new campaign for the new NX. It’s been a pleasure to see such a simple idea delivered so beautifully by Ne-O, too – the attention to detail is phenomenal, and the work has been crafted to within an inch of its life.”
Lexus Europe general manager brand communications Michael Tripp says: “The idea behind this campaign has an elegant simplicity to it that we immediately bought into, linking the striking design of the new NX to the world of art. This vehicle captures your attention and stands out on the road, and we wanted to reflect that in the work.”
The campaign, it’s really a whole marketing programme, is still, appropriately enough, a work in progress.
Much of the challenge is giving an identity to the NX, RX, CT whatever it is, as with Jaguar. You know where you are with Audi, BMW and Mercedes (mostly) with 1,2,3 or A,B,C. How many sales does that get them?
And the ads?
Say yes to the city – serviceable. MAA creative scale: 5.
The art of standing out (which appears to be being used globally): 7.5.
Getting there.
Art with a capital F.