On behalf of good taste
For a European campaign by Café Royal, Serviceplan Suisse casts Robbie Williams as a suave agent. Another smart touch: The capsules are compatible with all standard Nespresso machines.
WW: Robbie Williams has been making a splash since December 1 as brand ambassador for Café Royal from Delica. The campaign was launched in Paris. How did Serviceplan Suisse get the job with this superstar?
Christian Sommer: When we started our work for the client, it was already set that Café Royal wanted to do a testimonial campaign. Robbie Williams is considered a proven coffee lover, we knew that from his social media activities. He also appealed to the ladies in our agency, who have of course been following him for years. So the "brand fit" question was solved relatively quickly. But we didn't come up with the campaign via the testimonial per se, but first considered: What can be the format with which we can charge the brand? Since we didn't know whether we'd get Williams at all, we had to come up with a concept that wasn't so strongly attached to one person.
Christian Baertschi: It is clear that we are challenging the competition in the capsule market with this campaign. After all, they haven't done badly so far. Very well, in fact. It quickly became clear that we couldn't just use any other actor. Nor is that the intention of our brand. Since Café Royal capsules work in Nespresso machines, you could call it a clone. But it's not a clone. Café Royal is a premium brand. Accordingly, the challenge was: How can we top the campaign of our most successful competitor? The reason for a testimonial is that you can achieve a high profile very quickly. It buys you a shortcut in brand building, so to speak. That was the background for us. So we had to ask ourselves: What is even bigger than a well-known actor? The solution is: an entertainer. And there's hardly anyone better than Robbie Williams. He also fits the demographic, is very congruent with the target group, and is known throughout Europe.
Delica is a subsidiary of Migros. Why does it now want to conquer a market throughout Europe?
Baertschi: Café Royal is always among the top products in all blind tastings - regardless of the market. Café Royal even scores better than Nespresso. The Delica company in Birsfelden was founded by Gottlieb Duttweiler. It is now the largest coffee roasting company in Switzerland. Duttweiler also already operated his own plantation in Brazil. Migros' coffee business is therefore very solid and traditional. Now Café Royal is selling very well in Switzerland and is seriously competing with Nespresso. Café Royal will now be on retail shelves with appropriate distribution partners and not just marketed through direct sales. In France, these are primarily Carrefour and Monoprix. That covers a very large part of the catchment area. In Germany it's Edeka, among others, in Austria Spar, and in Switzerland of course Migros.
And the advertising everywhere comes from Serviceplan Suisse?
Baertschi: We have done everything. We've been working on this assignment for a good year. Serviceplan in Zurich developed the strategy, created the concept, organized the testimonial and negotiated the collaboration. We were able to build on the advantage of our group and access various resources. The idea for the commercial and the work for print came from the creation department in Zurich. Our PR agency here also does the media work for all markets, organized the event in Paris and is the press office for Café Royal. Zurich also realized the micro-site with our digital agency Plan.Net Suisse.
Summer: On top of that, there's a lot of other work, starting with event invitations in a very elaborate way. Last Monday we put on the launch event in Paris, including a concert with Robbie Williams. Together with Markenfilm we are already working on further films, all with funny scenes of Robbie Williams as an agent of good taste. But of course these are still "top secret".
"Top secret" was also the start of the campaign. What was the concept?
Baertschi: On November 17, we launched a teaser campaign in France, announcing the Agent of Good Taste - but still without mentioning Robbie Williams by name. We played that up more and more until the official media event. We spread speculation with a micro-site as well as through the fan clubs and Robbie Williams' Twitter and Facebook accounts. That's how fans knew something was going to happen. We then invited around 120 journalists to Paris for the launch on December 1. And the campaign has been running ever since.
Interview: Andreas Panzeri
