A huge banner promoting the 2021 Davis Cup in Madrid’s Gran Via which includes copy reading ‘In Madrid We Are Right And Left’ spearheads a Spanish campaign by rights holder the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and Kosmos Tennis Holdings has become a controversial hot topic amongst the nation’s sporting fraternity.
The OOH campaign, created by independent Barcelona based creative agency Smäll, aims to generate noise (and notoriety) and to reawaken interest in the event – the last edition of which was in 2019.
The Davis Cup outdoor execution reads: “We are forehand and backhand, serve and rest, volley and smash. We are to laugh and cry, to be silent and to shout. To cheer, to win, to celebrate, the party returns. The Davis Cup is back”.
But the focus of conversation and controversy around the billboard links back to two previous campaigns on the same site.
One refers to the recent political victory of Isabel Díaz Ayuso in the Madrid Assembly elections and the Davis Cup copy tweaks political references to tennis ones via right and left and forehands and backhands.
The second hot topic is that the same billboard site, which is close Real Madrid’s iconic Santiago-Bernabeu stadium, was also previously used by FC Barcelona President Joan Laporta for his ‘Excited To See You Again’ campaign to regain control of the rival Catalan club. And, as the tennis ad was created by Barcelona-based client Kosmos Tennis (which has partnered with the ITF to transform and organise the revised tournament) whose president is FC Barcelona star Gérard Piqué and the hero outdoor ad’s approach has been the subject of much controversy.
Vuelve la Copa Davis, estás IN?
Madrid
Innsbruck
Turín#DavisCup pic.twitter.com/qD75fVc7ej— Copa Davis (@CopaDavis) May 14, 2021
The banner was scheduled to hang in the high profile central Madrid OOH site for 15 days in May 31 where it will be seen by the 75,000 vehicles and 40,000 pedestrians that pass it every day.
The OOH flagship billboard is part of the wider 2021 ‘Are you In?’ campaign which spans OOH, print, digital and social channels.
La Copa Davis vuelve a estar IN ¿Estás IN?#DavisCup pic.twitter.com/tm3XnFdqN5
— Copa Davis (@CopaDavis) May 14, 2021
The next phase of the campaign, which will roll out in the coming weeks, will focus on ticket sales
“We wanted to make a lot of noise and to talk about the Davis Cup,” explains Kosmos Marketing Director Marc Carrion. “The phrase came from working together with the Smäll agency and this was one of their proposals which particularly inspired us and from our team came the phrase that made us all fall in love.”
As for Piqué’s participation in the campaign, Carrion explained that the Barcelona centre back was shown three proposals and fell in love with the one that we all liked and encouraged us to launch it.
The Davis Cup billboard has gone viral across Spain due to the way it leverages these previous initiatives fueled by plenty of Twitter reaction.
Comment:
This is a fine example not only of how OOH advertising can offer site-specific relevancy and power and showcases the return of outdoor sports marketing following the fallow pandemic period in which so much activation was switched to digital and virtual platforms.
But it also shows how traditional outdoor work can fuel social and digital coverage and conversation.
The 2021 iteration of the revised Davis Cup, which comes after the 2020 tournament was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, will take place three venues – Turin, Innsbruck and the Spanish capital – with the Madrid Arena hosting the final between 25 November and 5 December.
Kosmos Holdings is a sports and media investment group Piqué started with Hiroshi Mikitani (founder and chairman of Japanese e-commerce company and FC Barca sponsor Rakuten) and which was subsequently joined by Oracle founder and America’s Cup competitor Larry Ellison.
As well as owning football clubs in Spain, Kosmos and the ITF linked up for a 25-year, $3 billion partnership that will transform the Davis Cup and generate substantial revenues for global tennis development.
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