by Matthew Jones

Fruit Buzz [froot buz]: n. - (1) The excited, energized feeling you get when you eat one of McDonald’s new Fruit & Walnut Salads.  (2) A fresh, new, multi-cultural campaign from DDB Worldwide, Burrell Advertising and DRM that breaks traditional form and raises the bar for diversity in advertising.

When McDonald’s decided to launch a bold, new health-conscious addition to its menu, the fast food giant needed breakthrough creative and an aggressive strategy to catch consumers’ attention.  Enter DDB Chicago, general market agency of record for McDonald’s, and Burrell Advertising, one of the nation’s premier African-American agencies, and also a roster agency for the Golden Arches.  Hispanic agency DRM also helped answer the call.

The challenge was to launch the new Fruit & Walnut Salad, the latest healthy offering from the burger leader.  The result: Fruit Buzz – an innovative new campaign that blends live action film and sophisticated animation to form a memorable, effective collection of ads.

So what is a Fruit Buzz?  According to the top creative minds that service the McDonald’s account, it’s the feeling that comes from eating one of the new salads.

“The new Fruit & Walnut Salad is a departure for McDonald’s,” said Brenda Blonski, group creative director/writer, Burrell.   “It’s healthy and it tastes good – it gives you a Fruit Buzz.  It puts pep in your step.  It makes your day brighter.  It perks you up.”

The idea comes from insights gathered from the product’s main target: women.  “Women feel better, not just physically but also emotionally, when they eat fruit,” said Vida Cornelious, creative director, DDB Chicago.  "We took it a step further by calling it a Fruit Buzz.  It’s a renewed feeling that allows you to step out of your norm or change your attitude. The spots we created looked for a humorous way to execute that idea."

While the broad idea of Fruit Buzz originated with DDB, Burrell had plenty of leeway to put their inimitable signature on their work.

We wanted to make it a little livelier for our target, so we made the animation a literal part of our concept,” said Ed Zimkus, Creative Director at Burrell.  “We gave it a little Alice In Wonderland twist.  That’s the idea that got me excited.”

The client was not immediately comfortable with planning a major, adult-focused product launch around an animated campaign, but the agencies were able to seal the deal with fresh, bold creative and a sound strategy.

“It was a tough sell, initially,” said Cornelious.  “But we developed the creative on a timeline that was well in advance of the product launch, which allowed us the time to pursue something more innovative.  Because the product was new, they were open to a new approach.”

The campaign is a refreshing representation of diversity, both on the screen and behind the scenes.  More than half of the characters in the DDB creative are minorities, even though those spots are strictly for general market programming.  In one spot, entitled “Scooter,” an African-American couple is riding around town on a moped, with the woman at the wheel, of course.  In another TV ad, one of the major principles is Asian-American.  However, such diversity is not a new thing for McDonald’s, which has a long history of showcasing people of diverse races and ethnicity in its advertising.

“As always, McDonald’s asked us to represent the diversity in their consumers,” said Cornelious.  “(Our use of African-Americans and other people of color) was just a creative choice.”

Additionally, Burrell’s minority-targeted work has not been limited to African-American programming, which is often the case with other major advertisers.  Burrell’s work has been placed on some of TV’s highest rated shows, including ABC’s hit thriller LOST, and venerable morning show GOOD MORNING AMERICA, major sports programming and NBC’s primetime hit series, LAW AND ORDER, to name a few.

Aside from the diversity, one thing that really shines through all of the Fruit Buzz work is the amazing quality of the digital animation used to create the spots.  Walking the fine line between reality, fantasy and fun, the work certainly catches your eye.

The Art of Animation

As one might imagine, creating these spots posed unique challenges to the creative and production teams that brought them to life.  Even for the most modern techniques, these types of animation require a live shoot, followed by months of post-production work – all for what amounts to less than a minute of television time.

The two agencies were looking for two different looks and textures for their work, and as a result, they ended up using different animation techniques.

“(DDB Chicago) wanted to use motion capture – the same technology used for (Warner Brothers' animated feature) POLAR EXPRESS,” said Zimkus.  “We didn’t go that way.  We used CGI computer animation – what they used for major motion pictures like (Pixar’s animated hit smash) THE INCREDIBLES – where you actually create the characters and the movement.”

DDB Chicago used the equally complex process of motion capture, which involves placing sensors on the actors’ bodies, monitoring the movements of the body and the face.  The sensors then generate a wire frame in a computer, which can be moved and manipulated to mimic human movement, right down to facial expressions.  According to Cornelious, this created exactly the look the team wanted.

“There was a lot of discussion about how the animation was going to look," explained Cornelious.  “This being a women’s spot, we wanted to break through the clutter (by using animation), but we didn’t want to be childish or cartoonish.  It had to be very sophisticated – very contemporary.”

Bringing Life to the Characters

As important as the animation quality is, it is perhaps even more important to have well-developed, interesting and relatable characters. To this end, both agencies went above and beyond to make sure viewers noticed, liked and believed the characters that appear in the spots.

“We actually created the people,” said Blonski.  “We started with a back story for each girl.  We went through hundreds of magazines, deciding what we wanted them to look like – what clothes they wear, their body types, hair color, skin tones, and even their eye shadow.”

As the physical elements of the characters came together, so did the emotional elements.  “We gave them all names – Elaine, Kim, Nina and Candy,” said Debbie Amsden, executive producer, Burrell.  “We’d talk about them like they were (real people).”

And just like real people, sometimes these women had bad hair days, and made the occasional fashion faux pas.  “One of the girls was wearing cargo pants, and we decided that they looked too bulky, so we changed her pants,” continued Amsden.  “For the other girls we tried on glasses and a variety of accessories.”

Once the characters were established, the creative and production teams could concentrate on their surroundings, building not only a believable environment, but also an environment that supported the strategic directives.  For example, the Burrell team had to make sure the area where their characters lived reflected the areas of their target audience.

“We knew they lived in an urban neighborhood,” said Zimkus.  “We put them in a townhouse with a patio, but we didn’t want it to look too suburban.  We had to decide what kind of furniture they had.”

From there, it was good, old-fashioned blocking, just like piecing together a live shoot.  “We had to figure out ‘how do we get her from the street to the back patio?  We can’t waste time establishing (too much detail),” said Zimkus.  It’s like blocking any live shot.  The way we cut it, it worked out beautifully.”

For both agencies, the finished campaign seems to reflect the long weeks and hard work that went into making it.  The work is noticeable – smart and sophisticated.  The characters seem real – for some people, maybe even too real, according to Blonski.

“My friend called me and asked ‘Is that supposed to be me?’” continued Blonski.  In actuality, it actually was based, a little, on her unnamed friend.  “I was also accused of putting myself in the spot.”

That feeling of familiarity is the point, according to Blonski.  “(The campaign) needs to be relevant to African-American women,” she said.  “We love the idea of the relationship between the women – it’s something African-American women can relate to.  We wanted to make them real, even though they’re animated.  They seem like they could be your girlfriends.”

It’s too early to tell how much of an impact the campaign has had on the Fruit & Walnut Salad sales, but the initial anecdotal feedback is very strong on both sides.

“We had one print ad comparing the Fruit & Walnut Salad to eight days in Cabo San Lucas,” said Cornelious.  “Their Minister of Tourism actually called to say they loved the ad, and that people had actually called them (after seeing the ad).”

“The initial data (on the spot would indicate) it’s been very well received and well-recalled,” said Blonski.

Fruit Buzz: The Movie

Any successful body of work requires a team of people pulling together emotionally and intellectually, which is how both agencies breathed life into this campaign.  The excitement is reflected in the voices of the creative team as well as their animated creations.

“The fun of it was, we knew what the givens were,” said Zimkus.  “We needed to figure out what twist we could give it – how we were going to ‘dimensionalize’ Fruit Buzz.  You have to know what elements to keep, and where you can stretch the ideas.”

Both agencies were quick to mention the invaluable contributions of their directors and post-production houses for creating such ground-breaking work.  DDB partnered with directors Kylie Matulick, Todd Mueller and Marco Spier, and teamed with animation innovator PSYOP, out of New York, for their spots.  Burrell commissioned director Jeb Milne, and hot animation shop Wit Animation out of Venice, California.

The success of the Fruit Buzz animation, which is insightful, engaging and memorable, as DDB puts it, is the result of multiple efforts.

Cornelious acknowledged that agencies and post houses are unable to do everything themselves; and that it takes a bold, aggressive client to bring cutting-edge work to the airwaves.

“I have to commend McDonald’s for taking a real leap of faith,” said Cornelius.  “They learned more than they wanted about animation – they stayed involved and engaged through a long process with motion capture and development.  It took vision on their part.”

The next challenge for both DDB Chicago and Burrell Advertising is to top themselves in their next effort, which may or may not include animation.  Either way, both teams are up to the task.

“We want to do a sequel.  We’re ready,” joked Zimkus.

THE END