A new marketing initiative from meditation brand Calm leveraged the start of the new NBA season through a multi-channel campaign fronted by LA Lakers super star LeBron James.
The initiative, which was created with James’ own agency SpringHill Co., is the latest chapter in Calm’s multi-year partnership with the hoops hero which began in 2019.
Kicking off with a social teaser and led by a hero spot which spanned television and online platforms, James appears in the anchor 30-second sleep-focused spot alongside the Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA.
“My fellow risk takers and move makers – what happened to us? We hustle and grind without resting our mind. Greatness lies on the other side of sleep,” James says in the ad, while RZA stars as a celestial sleep guru.
The king of sleep x the king of hip-hop.
Dropping Monday, October 18. @KingJames @RZA pic.twitter.com/sDQC0Q2WwK
— Calm (@calm) October 15, 2021
The has spoken: you need to sleep https://t.co/fEUnueolV2
— Calm (@calm) October 18, 2021
The campaign rolled out as the 2021/2 NBA season got underway in Mid-October and spans national broadcast TV, digital and social work and out-of-home ads that show James lying down.
As well as the core commercial, the integrated campaign also saw James record a ‘Sleep Story’ set to a score by RZA, while James also again lends his voice to Calm’s ‘Train Your Mind’ audio series hosted on the brand’s web hub and mobile app.
“We wanted to highlight that part of our goal as a company is to destigmatize mental health, and sleep is a key element to that,” said Calm Marketing VP Monica Austin who described sleep as one of “LeBron’s essential superpowers”.
“This is Calm’s biggest financial campaign of the year,” Austin adds. “Young men, especially today, are driven by this idea of hustle culture expectations about how men need to be showing up in the world,” she said. “Our belief is that non-stop hustle is not leading to greatness — it’s leading to burnout and exhaustion.”
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He might be busy on the court from mid-October, but beforehand James clearly had a packed advertising and marketing schedule which also included fronting a campaign for at-home fitness brand Tonal as well as cameo appearance in the NBA’s own ‘NBA Lane’ new season spot and fronting a new Mountain Dew’s new ‘Rise Energy’ marketing push.
Calm, which was founded nine years ago, is a key resource for those seeking relaxation and de-stressing techniques and has expanded over the last two years as societal anxiety levels have spiked due to multiple factors ranging from the pandemic, to climate change, social injustice, social media stress and politics.
At the end of last year the company was valued at $2 billion and it is part of an expanding category which also includes rivals such as Headspace.
The brand has been working with SpringHill, the agency, which is co-run by James and partner Maverick Carter, since 2019.
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