Mid March saw Under Armour leverage its athlete ambassador alliance with heavyweight boxing champion Anthony Joshua via a campaign that explores mental determination called ‘Your Greatest Opponent Is You’.
The campaign, which aims to inspire young athletes through Joshua’s own thirst for success, leverages increased fan attention around Joshua’s ahead of his next heavyweight unification fight against Joseph Parker on 31 March (in Cardiff).
The initiative is spearheaded by a 60-second spot that revolves around shadow boxing – which the sportswear brand uses as a metaphor for mental strength.
In addition to the video, the campaign spans PR, retail, OOH channels, as well as digital and social content and it will run continuously up to the fight.
The new campaign, the first work for the brand by Lucky Generals and sister sports marketing agency Dark Horses, uses the metaphor of shadow boxing to dramatise how even great athletes like Joshua must overcome their internal demons to succeed.
The campaign was developed in a partnership between creative agency Lucky Generals and sister sports marketing agency Dark Horses.
According to a statement from Lucky Generals that formed part of the campaign’s PR launch work: “Using the metaphor of shadow boxing, the campaign dramatizes how even great athletes like AJ in the world must overcome their internal demons to really improve their performance and deliver when it matters.”
The spot was directed by Walter Campbell and the producer was Donnie Masters. The production company was Serious Pictures, the editor Nick Gilberg, while VFX post was handled by Electric Theatre Collective and SFX post by 750mph. Music was by Soundtree, photography by Perou the print production company was JSR.
Comment:
This self-described ‘high-concept’ campaign aims to bring the brand’s ongoing, global umbrella #IWILL positioning to life.
Clothing brand Under Armour has been going through a challenging year (both from a PR and a share price perspective), but, with 857,470 YouTube views in the first 48 hours since it was posted, this video shows that the combination of the brand and Joshua remains a serious marketing draw.
The campaign comes almost a year after Under Armour’s ‘Inspired By Greatness’ initiative leveraging his historic world heavyweight title fight against Wladimir Klitschko (see case study).
Links:
Under Armour
https://www.youtube.com/user/underarmour
https://twitter.com/UnderArmour
https://www.facebook.com/Underarmour.uk/
Lucky Generals
Anthony Joshua
https://twitter.com/anthonyfjoshua
https://www.instagram.com/anthony_joshua/
https://www.facebook.com/anthonyjoshuaboxer/
