Explosion of Creativity on Auckland Billboard

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23 July 2007

Explosion of Creativity on Auckland Billboard

A Deadline Couriers billboard made New Zealand advertising history yesterday evening when it exploded in a 6-metre fireball in Auckland’s CBD.

Crowds gathered to watch the Nelson Street billboard’s digital clock countdown the last few seconds to 6pm – the deadline set for the billboard to self-destruct after it was erected last Monday.

Brent Smart, Managing Director of Colenso BBDO, the advertising agency behind the stunt, said the billboard explosion went exactly as planned and generated an unprecedented amount of interest throughout the week.

“It’s not about what brands say any more, it’s about what brands do. Creating actions for the brand that deliver an experience or content that engages people. In this case, instead of saying something on one billboard, we thought about how we could turn one billboard into a bigger story for the brand,” said Mr Smart.

A web cam on the www.self-destruct.co.nz website provided a live video feed of the billboard counting down and the subsequent explosion.

The exploding billboard was used to reinforce the brand promise of Deadline Couriers – when we give you a time we mean it.

Deadline Couriers Managing Director Ian Meek said he was blown away by the creativity Colenso demonstrated in devising the campaign.

“The exploding billboard was a very unexpected response to our initial brief. In the end, we just wanted to get lots of people talking about the Deadline brand, which is why we loved the idea from the outset,” said Mr Meek.

Leading New Zealand pyrotechnics company FilmFX & Rollercoaster Design, who worked on the feature film Nania, was used to create the explosion which occurred in a number of stages.

When the clock hit zero the billboard self-destructed in an explosion created by nitramine dry powder, strobe grenades and smoke bombs.

ENDS

Credits
Agency: ColensoBBDO
Creative Director: Richard Maddocks
Creative Team: Jamie Hitchcock and Josh Lancaster
Producer: Paul Courtney

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