Boots has scrapped its ‘someone cares’ campaign, which has run for the
past five years, in favour of a new line which will make its debut in
the run-up to Christmas.
The campaign, by J. Walter Thompson, breaks on national television on
Thursday and is based on the sentiment, ‘look good; feel good’. The new
endline is: ‘Boots: the right chemistry.’
The series of eight commercials uses a montage of yuletide images to
communicate the emotion of Christmas and the breadth and range of
products available at Boots. The commercials feature images of smiling
children, black-and-white shots of a 50s-style American Christmas, shots
of a traditionally clad Santa Claus, and scenes of shoppers coming home
from Boots with their Christmas presents.
The films are all backed by the original recording of the song, Make
Someone Happy, by Jimmy Durante. The track will be released by Warner
Music as a single at the beginning of December.
The campaign kicks off with a 60-second commercial to establish the
‘giving’ mood of Christmas. This is then followed by two 30-second and
five ten-second ads which provide the opportunity to showcase the range
of Boots gift ideas.
All eight commercials were shot on location in New Zealand and were
directed by Hugh Harkness through Harkness Sayers. They were art
directed by Mike Murphy and written by Mark Wilkins at JWT. Media
planning and buying is through BMP DDB.
Stephen Carter, JWT’s managing director, said: ‘‘Care’ has been a useful
and commercially successful theme for Boots for a number of years.
However, in the fiercely competitive retail context of the mid-90s, the
task is to go beyond this to add stimulation and invigoration to the
Boots brand offering.’
Jaspar Shelbourne, the executive creative director of JWT, added:
‘Drawing on a library of material we were able to put together a series
of commercials that truly capture the feel-good spirit of Christmas.’
