How Publicis cleverly circumvents the knife advertising ban on Meta
Swiss Army knives have a problem: they can’t be advertised on Facebook and other social media platforms. The new campaign for Victorinox, launched as part of Publicis and Meta’s first Creative Impact Challenge, shows that it’s possible after all.
The Swiss Army Knife from Victorinox is loved all over the world. Everywhere? Not quite. Unfortunately, it meets with a little less love on Instagram and Facebook: the iconic product is not allowed to be advertised on these channels because such knives are categorized as weapons. Although this regulation by parent company Meta is understandable in principle, it puts Victorinox at a major disadvantage when it comes to social media presence.
As part of the first Creative Impact Challenge by Publicis and Meta, which was looking for the most creative briefing, Victorinox won with the very same task: advertise our product that is not allowed to be advertised. The result of this challenge can be seen on Facebook and Instagram these days. Or not. Because how do you advertise a product that you're not allowed to show? Well, by not showing it.
Hand movement imitated
"Of course, you can't do this with every one of our products," says Tessa Ramezani from Victorinox, adding: "But especially with a product as iconic and world-famous as our Swiss Army Knife, it is remarkably enough to simply recreate the hand movement. We are delighted with the creative implementation as part of the Creative Impact Challenge and that we can now finally promote our flagship product on social media thanks to Publicis."
The campaign, which went live this week, was implemented entirely in-house by Prodigious Zurich and will be visible on the Instagram and Facebook channels until the end of the year.
Responsible at Victorinox: Daniela Sandau-Jensen (Head of Content Factory), Tessa Ramezani (Senior Manager Content Project). Responsible at Publicis Zurich: Matthias Koller (CEO/overall responsibility), Rob Hartmann (ECD), David Lübke (CD), Priska Meyer (Senior Art Director), David Voges (Senior Copywriter), Nico Yang (AD), Maaike Fortuijn (Junior AD), Sandro Looser (Client Service Director), Irena Igić (Junior Account Manager). Responsible at Prodigious Zurich (film production): Stefan Rüegg (Head of Studio/Senior Producer), Matteo Attanasio (Senior Producer/Camera Operations), Ian Oggenfuss (Producer/Postproduction), Patrick Richner (Junior Producer), Philipp Zubler (Motion Designer). Responsible at Bagels of Berkeley: Luciano Hagge Dias (Digital Business Director), Tatjana Streit (Social Consultant), Aurore von Oppersdorff (Social Creative).
