Nike Korea teamed up with Wieden+Kennedy Tokyo and Object & Animal director Natalie Rae to roll out a local market campaign running under the sportswear behemoth’s new ‘Play New’ brand platform.
The campaign seeks to bring attention to the genuine value of sports and aims to position ‘joy’ as the new sporting standard. It is based on Nike’s brand belief that people can change the world through the power of sport. The initiative sets out to celebrate the joy of sports: not as defined by elite competition, excellence or rigidity, but instead by inclusion, fun and breaking the boundaries of what sport means for all people and their communities.
The hero Korean commercial is fronted by a set of trail blazers led by South Korean short track speed skater Shim Suk-hee who shared her voice and brought significant changes to society and also features Faker (an eSports professional gamer who has consistently promoted the positive power of sports), CL (a singer who inspires the public with her unique personality and stage performance), Choi Woo-sik (an actor who captured huge attention with his energy and colorful charms), plus table tennis star Shin Yoo-bin and skateboarder Cho Hyun-joo who both serve as strong examples of Korea’s bright future on the world’s sporting stage.
The lead spot launched on 29 May across the brand’s own digital and social channels and national television.
Alongside the creative, Nike Korea also introduced a statement called ‘Promise for a New Future of Sports’ to encourage more athletes to join in this journey. It delivers a message to become courageous for all, relish pure joy of sports and speak out to the world, without being bound by winning or losing.
“As with the saying that one must break out of the old world to be born new, I believe that no matter how hard it is to move forward a new chapter for change, if someone does not speak out, we will be just stuck in a long-standing vicious cycle of many unfair practices,” said Shim Suk-hee in the campaign PR material. “The fact that more people are gathering voices through the ‘Play New’ campaign can be seen as the new beginning of a big change,”
Nike Korea VP Jamie Kim added: “At Nike, we aim to empower athletes and give them the confidence to pursue new goals, find their voices and build their community. Whether that’s through dance, yoga, running, or any other sport or movement, we know it helps to transform the world in positive ways for our next generation.”
Director Natalie Rae commented: “Hearing these young athlete’s experiences with sports abuse was haunting. And in 2021, completely infuriating. Witnessing each athlete’s ability to channel their experiences into pure passion, joy and play gave me hope for this generation. This was one of the most meaningful commercial productions I’ve been part of and these kids inspired my heart to be stronger.”
The campaign was created for Nike Korea by a team at agency Wieden+Kennedy Tokyo which included Creative Director Curro De La Villa, Lead Creative Nedal Ahmed, Creatives Sohyun An, Chaeyeong Seo, Head Of Production Kerli Teo, Senior Producer Jennifer Chien, Account Director Shinya Kamata, Account Team Member Kaede Ose, Comms Planning Director Justin Lam, Strategic Planning Director Thijs Van De Wouw, Studio Designer Donna Kwon, Studio Manager Aiwei Ichikawa, Agency Editor Jacob Kim, PR Executive Midori Sugama, Executive Creative Director Scott Dungate, Managing Director Yosuke Suzuki and Research Consultant Max Kim.
The production company was Object & Animal with Director Natalie Rae, Executive Producer Dom Thomas, Producer Ellie Fry and Director Of Photography Rina Yang.
The service production company was Nine Tailed Fox, with editing by Trim, music from Alex Epton of Xl Recordings and sound design by Jack Sedgwick of Wave London and colour by The Mill New York, while VFX were handled by MPC Shanghai.
Comment:
The ‘Play New’ brand platform launched globally at the start of May with a multi-market core campaign supported by local country initiatives like this one on Korea and a football-themed strand in the UK fronted by Marcus Rashford.
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