Behind the UPS Whiteboard ads
UPS ad does the white thing
March 2, 2007
BY LEWIS LAZARE Sun-Times Columnist
We write about ad campaigns a lot. And then we expect to see them on television, but often never do. Then there are ads we don't preview and they later impress us.
We never wrote about one out-of-the-ordinary campaign for UPS called "Whiteboard" when it broke a couple of months ago. Since then, we've sure seen the various executions scores of times while watching television.
The commercials, 11 in all, feature a relatively young man with long, dark hair, a hint of a smile and a most unassuming manner who stands before a white board on which he scribbles images and words while talking about what separates UPS from its rivals in the highly competitive package shipping business.
That man doing all the talking and writing on the white board is actually a creative director named Andy Azula at the ad agency that created the campaign. The Martin Agency in Richmond, Va., had its already high profile upped a notch or two when it emerged victorious in the re-review for the $570-million Wal-Mart advertising account.
But as we were saying, we've seen various iterations of this UPS "Whiteboard" campaign numerous times. And one thing has surprised us again and again: We haven't grown weary of watching and listening to Azula.
That might not seem like such a remarkable revelation. But given how quickly we tire of so much mediocre advertising, the point is more extraordinary than it might seem on its surface.
We're tried to analyze why this UPS campaign works so well, and we keep coming back to the realization that it succeeds because it is simply trying to communicate a real series of messages in a simple, direct way. Sounds so easy, doesn't it?
Well, maybe.
But given the glut of mediocre commercials screaming at us on television, this kind of simplicity is a most welcome antidote to so much that we just want to tune out.
Plus, this campaign benefits greatly from the way Azula ever so gently inserts a humorous fillip at the end of most of the spots. It isn't much, usually, but it's always smart. And it invariably helped send us away quite satisfied with the clarity -- and civility -- of Azula's and UPS' message.