Kobe Bryant is far from a household name in the UK, in fact if you ask a British citizen, “have you heard of Kobe?” they would probably respond saying, “yeah, it’s in Japan isn’t it?”.
In China, however, Kobe Bryant is as famous as he is in the States. Now the basketball megastar, nicknamed “The Black Mamba“, is endorsing yet another product in China (you may remember he recently teamed up with Jay Chou to promote Sprite).
The product is the Mercedes-Benz ‘Smart Car‘. Below is the new commercial featuring Kobe that premiered on Sina Weibo, something that has never been done before:
On Youtube
On YoukuThe new campaign is called, “Big, In The City“. Its aim is to prove that the ‘Smart Car’ is not small and has more than enough room for two people. So who better to prove this than, their new brand ambassador, the 6ft 6in (198cm) LA Lakers star.
As part of the campaign there will also be roadshow that will tour 25 major Chinese cities. Kobe himself will be visiting, “his home away from home” (aka China) in July for a Smart Car customer party.
You may notice some fancy pieces of art in the commercial, these were in fact created by the famous Fang Lijun. Speaking of art, here are the campaign posters that will be featured on urban Chinese billboards in April.
Agency credit to: BBDO China (Beijing Branch)
Project: Smart Car’s ‘Big, in the city’ campaign
Client: Mercedes-Benz China
Executive creative directors: Tim Evill, Tianit Ng
Ceative director: Matt Phillips
Copy writer: Aliang Lai
Senior producer: Hana Zhang
Production house: Radical Media
Director: Dave Meyers
Executive producer: Tommy Turtle
DOP: Colin Watkinson
Post production: PixelBox
Editor: Nick Diss
Music: Massive Music
Media agency: MEC Beijing, MEC Interaction Beijing, Kinetic Outdoor
Managing partner: Michelle Yang
Client team lead: May Piao, Corinna Chen (Digital), Nicole Xu (OOH)
Supporting team Fabric Gong, Sarah Lou, Eve Luo, Jean Zhao
