Gingerbread Man Meets a Grisly End in Holiday Promotion for Fangoria

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The Gingerbread Man (also known as the Gingerbread Boy) first appeared in print in the May 1875 of St. Nicolas Magazine, a popular American children’s magazine. Unlike Gingy from the Shrek movie series, the Gingerbread Man from the original story was kind of a jerk, taunting several humans and animals before he’s finally outsmarted by a hungry fox.

In a series of posters created by to promote holiday gift subscriptions to horror magazine Fangoria, the Gingerbread Man meets a trio of grisly ends. On one execution he’s stretched across a cookie rack, while in another he’s dipped into a toaster and shredded on a cheese grater (the red sprinkles are everywhere) by a dead-eyed fellow gingerbread man.

The campaign was created by Toronto agency Zulu Alpha Kilo, with models created by Oxenham Design.

[via Gute Werbung]

Canada

Interval House Promotes Domestic Violence Awareness with ‘Every Second Counts’

Interval House - Buy This Second

Nice work here from Toronto agency Union for Interval House, a centre for abused women and children now in it’s 40th year.

Every Second Matters‘ highlights the shocking statistic that every second a woman in Canada becomes a victim of domestic violence. To bring this statistic to life at a more personal level, the web site visitor is prompted to connect the experience to their Facebook profile.

As the site loads images from the Facebook profiles of your female friends, the copy reads “Who has to be affected to make you care?”

The site is hoping to raise funds to continue their work by having visitors buy up one (and hopefully more) of the 86,400 seconds that make up each day.

[via Ads of the World]

Canada

A&W Tweets Mouth-Watering Response to Rogers Outage

With a service outage affecting nearly two thirds of Rogers 10 million Canadian customers, thousands took the opportunity to use social media to vent their anger and frustration with the company.

However, over at A&W Canada, their social team was taking things in stride, tweeting “#Rogers is down? I needed both hands to hold this Teen Burger anyway.

The post came complete with a first-person view of a fully loaded burger.

Canada

Body Waxing Bar Takes Coupon Rip-Off Campaign to the Streets of Toronto

Fuzz Wax Bar - Street Rip-off

During the recent Pride Week festivities in Toronto, a Fuzz Wax Bar promotion proved to be real “rip-off”. Wax strips that doubled as coupons (with directions to the salon) were attached to the still-hairy (for the moment) bodies of a very brave male model. People passing by were invited to then “rip-off” one of the coupons for a 25 discount on their next waxing.

As seen in the video, the waxing strips are colour-coded based on the sensitivity of their location on the body.

Watching the clip brought back memories of watching Steve Carell’s famous chest-waxing scene in the 40-Year-Old Virgin. Unlike Carell’s movie character, the coupon-covered male model doesn’t resort to random obscenities or invoking the name of Kelly Clarkson.

The campaign was created and executed by Toronto’s Lowe Roche.

[via Media in Canada]

Canada

Land Rover Releases Stinky Air Fresheners That Smell Like Smoke and Hot Asphalt

Land Rover - City Scent

First invented in the early 1950s by Swiss-born Canadian businessman Julius Sämann, Little Trees air fresheners can be found hanging from the rear-view mirrors of vehicles around the world.

The air fresheners are now available in dozens of fragrances ranging from Cotton Candy to Pina Colada to New Car Scent. The classic scent of Royal Pine that started it all was influenced by the aromatics that Sämann had studied in the forests of Canada.

Speaking of the Canadian outdoors… to promote the introduction of the Land Rover Range Rover Sport, Y&R Canada has released a limited edition “City Scent” air freshener for your car featuring the smell of concrete, smoke and hot asphalt. City Scent will provide a pungent reminder to those drivers who wander too far away from town.

The limited edition air fresheners are available to Canadian residents who sign up for updates at LandRover.ca.

[via Campaign Brief US]

Canada

Molson Creates Beer Fridge That Can Only Be Opened With Canadian Passport

Molson Canadian - Beer Fridge Opens by Canadian Passport

Just in time for Canada Day, we have a new ad for Molson Canadian, but it has me thinking that someone’s been watching too many Coca-Cola Happiness Machine videos. However, a fridge full of cold beer has far more potential to spread happiness as far a I am concerned.

The ad created by Rethink, features a beer fridge created by London(UK)-based effects company Artem. The bright red fridge was left at random spots in France, Belgium and the UK, and could only be opened by scanning a Canadian passport.

Thankfully for the thirsty locals, a Canadian tourist is quickly located nearby. Their passport scanned and cold bottles of Molson Canadian is distributed for all to enjoy.

Building The Beer Fridge

[via Globe & Mail]

Canada

Surrender Control of Your Tweets to Raise Awareness of Tourrette Syndrome

Tourette Syndrome Foundation of Canada - Surrender Your Say

Today, (June 19) people who follow my Twitter account may see some unusual tweets. I’ve volunteered control of my Twitter account for the next 24 hours as part of “Surrender Your Say“, a campaign to help raise awareness of Tourette syndrome. I’ll have no control over what is being posted or the frequency that I post, to mimic the sudden involuntary vocal or physical actions associated with the condition.

“The biggest obstacle for people dealing with Tourette Syndrome is the attitude that people have when they see someone with physical and vocal tics. Without knowledge of the disorder, people are quick to judge. Surrender Your Say will help more people become familiar with the disorder and will help achieve the TSFC goal that all people who have Tourette Syndrome will lead quality lives as accepted and valued members of an informed, tolerant society.”
– Cathy Wylie, TSFC President

The initiative created by Saatchi & Saatchi Canada, and has attracted over 1800 participants last time I checked.

[via Great Ads]

Canada

lululemon Post Tongue-in-Cheek CEO Wanted Ad on Home Page

lululemon CEO Wanted

It hasn’t been a great week for Canadian lifestyle retailer lulemeon. On Monday, CEO Christine Day announced she was stepping down after five years in the job.

Despite the company’s stock price has taking a hit after the announcement, Friday morning the company posted a tongue-in-cheek help wanted ad for a new CEO on their website’s home page.

According to the job listing the prospective candidate should have the following qualifications:

  • You communicate powerfully, often through Sanskrit
  • You are disciplined, focused and can hold headstand for at least 10 minutes
  • You’re a long-term thinker. You already have a plan to bring yoga and luon to Mars by 2018
  • You break all the rules like getting your OM-on (loudly) whenever the urge arises
  • You elevate and cultivate the level of talent within the senior leadership team by holding The Bachelor lululemon. Only one successful SVP will get the final rose
  • Not only do you lead the organization to create components for people to live long, healthy and fun lives, you know the secret to how they got the caramel in the Caramilk bar
  • You wear The Mansy to lead our company-wide morning chant and kombucha ritual

In addition the finer print states; Your go-to party trick is your dead-on impression of the yogi in “Sh*T Yogis Say”, in reference to a widely-viewed video the company posted in December 2011.

Shit Yogis Say

[via Ad Age]

Canada

World Vision Canada’s Hard-Hitting Campaign Against Child Slavery

World Vision Canada - No Child for Sale

At first, I didn’t quite no what I was seeing as I looked up from what I was doing. On the TV I saw a small child being advertised for sale on what looked like a shopping channel.

By the time I had found the remote and turned on the sound, the logo for World Vision Canada appeared and what I was seeing began to make some sense. What doesn’t make sense is the daunting statistic that every year over 1.2 million children around the world are sold into slavery. Find out more about child slavery and how you can help at nochildforsale.ca.

The campaign came to life with a stunt executed at Pam Chorley’s Fashion Crimes in Toronto and at Vancouver’s Crocodile Baby. Word of a secret sale brought people and press to the sidewalk in front of both stores, where paper covering the windows was removed to reveal a shocking display of child actors portraying child labourers sewing and breaking bricks.

The media and creative come from KBS+P Canada Toronto-based Real Interactive.

No Child Should Ever Be For Sale TV Campaign

The Making of ‘No Child Should Ever Be For Sale’

[via Creative Criminals]

Canada

Calgary Zoo Publishes 2012 Annual Report on Instagram

Calgary Zoo 2012 Annual Report on InstagramThere’s no denying that photo uploads are a huge part of people’s internet activities. Each day an average of 40 million photos are uploaded to Instagram alone.

Tasked with creating the 2012 annual report for the Calgary Zoo, Trigger Communications made note of the large number of images that zoo visitors had uploaded with the hashtag #calgaryzoo. If their audience was using Instagram to express their relationship with the zoo, why shouldn’t they. With client approval the team set out to create and deliver the 2012 annual report in Instagram.

The execution fit well with a limited budget and the conservation values of the zoo. Original photos were shot with iPhones, and copy was reworked for readability within Instagram’s caption and comments format. Copies of the financial statements, which are presented as photos as well, are available in a more reader-friendly version by request.

This isn’t the first time that Trigger has come up with a creative solution for a Calgary Zoo annual report. The 2011 annual report was published as a one-page foldout printed on recycled newsprint.

[via The Trigger Blog]