In 2012, Coke asked us to bring back the Polar Bears for the Super Bowl.
What we came up with was a fully integrated campaign that featured 2 Polar Bears, one rooting for New York and one for New England, who watched and reacted to the game in real time.
For the entirety of the game, we digitally “puppeted” the Polar Bears via a game system we built. The Bears’ reactions to every play and every commercial were streamed live to CokePolarBowl.com.
Millions of viewers tuned in to watch the game with our Bears.
My partner and I were the ones responsible for controlling the Bears during the game.
It was the most stressful and most exciting 3 hours of my life.
Our TV spots were synched up to our digital livestream. We produced multiple versions of each spot and ran the appropriate version depending on what was happening in the game.
During the first quarter, The Polar Bear rooting for the underdogs (NY) let his nerves show in the spot "Superstition".
In the second quarter, New England was behind, prompting our New England Polar Bear to step out for some fresh air.
And finally, in the third quarter, New York lost their lead to New England. And our NY Polar Bear responded appropriately.
Our campaign won multiple awards that year including the following:
- Gold-Cannes Direct Lion-Fast Moving Consumer Goods
- Silver-Cannes Media Lion-Best Use of Screens
- Bronze-Cannes Direct Lion-Social Media and Viral Marketing
- Bronze-Cannes Film Lion-Interactive Film
- Bronze-Cannes Branded Content and Entertainment Lion-Best Use or Integration of Digital Media
- Shortlisted for Titanium Lion
- Shortlisted for Cyber Lion-Animation
- Shortlisted for Cyber Lion-Viral Marketing
- Silver-International ANDY Award-Integrated
- Silver-International ANDY Award-Reset
AD: Chris Thurman // CD: Hal Curtis, Jeff Gillette