Digital and Tech community BIMA has announced the Leventhorpe School, Hertfordshire and St Marylebone CE School as the joint winners of its 2020 Digital Day Industry Challenge, an initiative that brings digital careers to life for 11-16-year-olds and the only one of its kind in the UK. The winning schools developed innovative digital solutions in response to a challenge set by lead sponsor EPAM Systems, Inc.—a leading global provider of digital platform engineering and development services—to tackle food poverty as part of BIMA’s annual nationwide Digital Day event. Food poverty was already on the rise in the UK prior to COVID-19, with 1.9 million food bank parcels given to people between April 2019 – March 2020. Over the past year, the number of families requiring help increased exponentially. An issue that footballer Marcus Rashford has helped place front and centre of the National Debate, and a topic close to EPAM’s heart, made it the focus of this year’s challenge.
The first winning solution was submitted by the Leventhorpe School in Hertfordshire. It was elegantly simple—add a ‘donate’ button next to the ‘add to cart’ on supermarkets’ web pages, making it easy for online shoppers to buy and donate simultaneously. “So simple, we couldn’t believe it didn’t exist already,” was the judges’ response. The second winning entry came from the St Marylebone CE School in London. It too was as simple as it was impactful. The students suggested a ‘Buy Me to Help Another’ sticker be placed on supermarket products, alongside a social media campaign to drive shoppers to buy duplicates to send to food banks. Digital Day’s primary goal is to offer 11-16-year-olds an insight into the world of digital and help them discover the potential of a career as a digital practitioner. This year, thousands of students, in more than 140 schools nationwide, competed to create digital solutions to help resolve the challenge of food poverty. The winners receive money for their school and book tokens donated by EPAM, ITV and BIMA. ITV & Liberty Global (owner of local UK operator Virgin Media) have also donated cash to support the Trussell Trust, a charity that is working to end the need for food banks in the UK. Additionally, EPAM is running an ongoing fund matching campaign for the Trussell Trust.
Cadbury has launched a new campaign to support the return of its Find a Legend, Win a Legend promotion. The push was developed in partnership with creative agency ELVIS. For the fourth year of the campaign, Cadbury is partnering with six of the nation’s top football clubs, lining up a legend from each club, including Arsenal FC’s Ian Wright, Chelsea FC’s Petr Cech, Manchester United’s Gary Neville, Liverpool FC’s Robbie Fowler, Manchester City’s Micah Richards and Tottenham Hotspur’s Rafa van der Vaart. The push, which is part of Cadbury’s wider promotional activations strategy centred on its partnership with six of the nation’s top clubs, aims to get people buying standard chocolate following the festive period.
Consumers are invited to buy a promotional bar, and if they find a legend’s shirt inside their pack, they win an experience with the featured legend. If they don’t find a shirt in the pack, they can head online to legends.cadburyfc.com, enter their barcode, and find out if they have won a £5/€5 or £10/€10 club shop voucher or a personalised video message from one of the six club legends. As part of the campaign, Cadbury has worked with ELVIS to develop national social content starring football legend Ian Wright, which sees the viewer finding his shirt in their Cadbury pack, before it pops up in Wright’s living room, much to his surprise. ELVIS developed the concept as a playful analogy for the campaign headline, bringing to life the idea that finding the legends shirt inside your Cadbury pack launches you into the legend’s world. This activity is supported by club-specific content featuring the other football legends, as well as several radio ads.
Digital marketing agency Wolfenden has been chosen to help increase the brand awareness and profile for live-in care company Elder. Following a competitive pitch process, Elder chose Leeds-based Wolfenden to help the company build brand authority and gain more market share, with an organic-led strategy. W0lfenden’s approach will be focused on optimising and re-focusing what’s already in place to reach an even wider audience and build visibility for specific searches and intent, according to managing director Daisy Wolfenden.
DexCom, Inc., a specialist in continuous glucose monitoring for people with diabetes, has debuted its first-ever Super Bowl commercial, starring multi-platinum recording artist, actor and philanthropist Nick Jonas, who was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at the age of 13. The ad, which will run during Super Bowl LV on Feb. 7, 2021, calls for better care for people with diabetes who are still painfully pricking their fingers to measure their glucose levels. The ad, which will air at the end of the first quarter, shows how much various technologies have advanced over the last 40 years—contrasted by the realization that people with diabetes are still pricking their fingers to measure their glucose, a method invented in the 1970s.
Havas Media Group has announced the launch of Havas Entertainment, a new proposition to be headed up by Nick Wright, who is currently Managing Director of JUMP, Havas Media Group’s content and partnerships division. The 100-strong new offering aims to create meaningful moments in culture for entertainment brands battling for attention, as well as other brands which see entertainment as an effective vehicle to engage with key audiences. With in-depth expertise in film and TV, gaming, toys, music and culture and a data-driven blend of creativity, media, PR and CRM, Havas Entertainment will partner with brands to turn consumers into fans and fans into consumers.
Spark Foundry, the UK acceleration agency, has announced that tyre brand Falken, part of Sumitomo Rubber Industries, will sponsor a series of programmes on UKTV’s entertainment channel, Dave. Spark Foundry has supported Falken tyre UK distributor, Micheldever, with a new advertising strategy for the Falken tyre brand, spearheaded by the Dave TV sponsorship. In line with Falken’s growth in the UK, this marks the first national TV campaign for the tyre brand. Falken idents will appear before and after selected programmes – collectively called “Characters on Dave”. These will include popular shows such as QI XL, Travel Man and Would I Lie To You?. The campaign will run from Monday 1st February until November 2021.
