Christina Laczka, broadcast supervisor at Toronto’s PHD agency, tells MiC she’s a longtime b-ball fan. And that’s probably what prompted her to approach the National Basketball League’s marketing folks to kick around brand integration ideas for Hershey products.
Her move paid off big time in a decision to tie in Oh Henry! chocolate bars with popular Raptors announcer Chuck Sworsky – and by association his legions of fans – who have a tendency to cry ‘oh!’ during dramatic moments in a game. That, in turn, lead to the concept of ‘oh moments,’ Laczka recalls. ‘And that’s what brought us the idea of creating a ‘Show us your oh’ website and a contest to let people post videos of their best moves, or ‘oh moments,’ and then let site visitors vote on their favourites.’
After only two and a half weeks, the Canada-only OhHenry.ca site already has roughly four dozen, shall we say, extremely imaginative postings. The top vote getter, when the contest ends in late May, will win two tickets to an NBA conference playoff game.
But wins of another sort will hit the sports air waves next week. PHD and its creative agency, Toronto’s ACLC, chose their three favourite oh moment videos and incorporated them into three 30-second commercials with Sworsky doing the voiceovers. They break on March 5 on Raptors Television, TSN, The Score and Sportsnet. Between then and mid-June, says PHD account manager Joanna Leehouts, 18 more video postings will be worked into an undecided number of TV spots for Oh Henry!
‘Everyone involved is just thrilled with this (initiative), says Laczka, ‘especially because it fits in so well with Oh Henry!’s target demographic of adults 18-34.’
‘We’ve even got support from the NBA,’ adds Leehouts, ‘because their website features the oh moments postings and contest, and also drives visitors back to OhHenry.ca.’
