At the start of the 2023 Toyota AFL Premiership Season, the automotive title sponsor celebrated its 20th year as the league’s Premier Partner with a new ‘Feeling It’ campaign championing emotion, inspiration and inclusivity across the game.
Toyota’s Australian Football League (AFL) activation, developed with sports agency Gemba, runs with the ‘Oh What A Feeling’ tagline so long synonymous with Toyota and spans TV, online video, digital, social print and OOH with evolving executions rolling out through the 2023 Toyota AFL Premiership Season.
The campaign celebrates the sponsor’s AFL legacy and brings-to-life’s the car company’s contribution to footy communities across all levels: including its AFL title tie-up, its AFLW partnerships, plus its support for the Toyota AFL Wheelchair Championships, the Toyota AFL Inclusion Carnival and the local club led Toyota Good for Footy Raffle (which has raised AUS $10m to date) – each of these game partnerships has a dedicated execution and/or cut-down film within the campaign.
After years of supporting the game, the creative brings to life the brand’s understanding of just how footy makes all fans feel at all levels of the game: from community to joy and from agony to elation, it showcases the pride of pulling on a team jersey for the first time and lifting the cup.
The campaign was spearheaded by a hero film – launched on Channel 7 and Fox Footy- which features a montage of key AFL moments from the last two decades: including the Adelaide ‘Camry’ Crows first game in 1991, the joy of the Sydney Swans breakthrough Premiership win of 2005 and the agony and elation of Dom Sheed’s incredible winning kick of 2018, the ambition and validation of Daisy Pearce, and the inspiration and inclusion of all of those playing and supporting the game.
The hero spot is also supported by 15-second cut downs focusing on different themes such as ‘Fans’ and ‘Community’.
The campaign was briefed in by and created for a Toyota Australia marketing team which included Senior Manager of Marketing Integration Tim Stuckey, Manager of Events, Sponsorship and Promotions Jenny Huntley and Senior Sponsorship and Events Specialist Allison Fitzsimons.
The lead agency was sport and entertainment specialist Gemba where the group working on the project included Executive Creative Director Boyd Hicklin, Head of Creative and Production Alexandra Longbottom, Creative Producer Ally Kirkwood, Creative Director John Weir, Junior Creative Lachlan Wills, Designer Honey Terrill, Senior Account Director Lauren Ellis, Senior Account Manager Jess Connor, Account Manager Rebecca Dodunski, Head of Marketing Strategy Adam Hodge and Senior Marketing Consultant Rennie Gilchrist.
Media was handled by Spark Foundry and social by Red Havas.
Production and post-production was run through Mr Fox with Director Bill Irving (of Truce Films), Editors Andrew Stalph and Drew Moden and Online Producer Drew Moden. Music and sound was by Bang Bang Studios Composer and Sound Designer Tristan Dewey and Sound Producers Polly McGregor and Holli Dee.
Stills were handled by AFL Footy Focus Competition and the photographers were Phyllis Queally (Belief), Jayden Humphris (Joy), Blake Parry (Pride), Celina Whan (Pumped).
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This activation, which runs in parallel to ongoing initiatives such as ‘Footy For Good’
follows on from previous Toyota AFL standout activations such as 2021’s ‘This is Us’ and 2020’s ‘We Bounce Back’.
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