Recently, Guinness released an awesome ad featuring biathlete Tracy Barnes and her story of giving up her seat on the U.S. Olympic team to her twin sister Lanny, who was unable to qualify because of illness. Here is a little more on their story.
The ad, created by BBDO New York, is very simply visually just a slow zoom in on a still black and white photo of the twin sisters. But it tells their powerful story, one of sacrifice, strength and sisterly bond.
Sounds like a great ad, right? Well, you better watch it fast because it is not going to be around for long. According to Ad Age, the ad had be pulled soon to comply with U.S. Olympic Committee rules that generally prohibit marketers who are not official sponsors from featuring Olympic competitors, according to Guinness. This year’s ad blackout ran from Jan. 30th to Feb. 26th, according to rules posted on TeamUSA.org.
From Ad Age:
“Diageo-owned Guinness is not an Olympic sponsor, but competing brand Budweiser is an official Team USA sponsor. So Guinness wanted to take advantage of the short window it had by making a one-day media buy, including TV, YouTube and print ads in daily newspapers.
“We are not doing this as a guerilla marketing tactic to ride the wave of the Olympics,” said Diageo spokesman Jim Sias. “This is just a really powerful, inspirational story that we think really aligns with the DNA of what the Guinness brand is,” he added. “We really wanted to celebrate it and make this story more known and recognize it.”
This is a great story, and it should be seen by everyone.
This piece was written by Meredith Lepore and is reprinted by permission.
