Diwali advertising has its familiar ingredients: lights, sweets, gifts and homecomings. But the campaigns that stay with us often find something fresh within these traditions. A familiar emotion, an unexpected perspective or a simple story can make a festive film worth watching.

As brands roll out their Diwali campaigns for 2026, we’re bringing them together in one place. From thoughtful brand films to entertaining festive ads, this is a growing collection of campaigns capturing the many moods of Diwali.

Explore the videos below, discover the ideas behind them and check back as we add more campaigns throughout the festive season.

Amazon India – This Diwali, deliver the love

P•TAL: Punjabi Thathera Art Legacy – Bring Home Shubh Laabh

HP – The Lights of Change

KitKat – Break Hai Toh Vibe Hai

Haldiram’s – Our Diwali Begins After Yours

Sabhyata – #Gharaayilakshmi

Cadbury Celebrations – #ThisNokJhokIsSweet

Utsav by Titan – Celebrate The Bonds That Become Family

Vivo India – Joy Of Homecoming

Luminous Solar – Iss Diwali, Apni #SochKaDiya jalao

Flipkart – A Village with hidden Diwali Deals

Stylish and Comfortable Diwali with Paragon Footwear

Invesco Mutual Fund

Google India

Diwali may come around every year, but the stories brands choose to tell are always changing. We’ll keep updating this collection with more Diwali campaigns as they arrive. You can also explore our Film and Video Campaigns and revisit our collection of Diwali campaigns from 2022.

Through a collection of micro-spots and print executions, the campaign follows customers who cannot resist taking the first bite before reaching their destination. An elevator ride, the journey back to a car or even a stop outside the drive-thru becomes an opportunity to give in to their cravings.

When Hunger Interrupts the Journey Home

The central observation behind Impatience is straightforward. From the moment an order leaves the restaurant to the moment it reaches the table, there are plenty of opportunities for customers to give in to temptation.

The campaign brings this behaviour to life through different everyday situations. One visual features a woman in an elevator, reaching into her McDonald’s bag before completing her journey. Another shows a man leaning into his car to get to his food. A third features a customer on a scooter outside a McDonald’s drive-thru, opening his order before setting off.

Each execution captures a different expression of the same impatience. The characters have their food, but getting it home without eating it becomes another challenge altogether.

Making Everyday Behaviour the Advertising Idea

What makes the McDonald’s Impatience campaign interesting is its decision to focus on what customers do with their food rather than simply showing what they have ordered.

The familiar McDonald’s packaging helps establish the brand in each situation, while the characters’ actions carry the message. Instead of presenting a carefully arranged meal, the campaign shows people struggling to keep their orders untouched long enough to reach the table.

This gives the advertising a relatable starting point. The appeal of the food is communicated through the characters’ behaviour rather than a direct claim about taste or quality. Their impatience becomes the expression of their craving.

Humour comes from placing this behaviour in ordinary settings. An elevator is usually a place to wait for a few floors, while a car journey is simply a means of getting somewhere. In these situations, however, neither activity seems important enough to delay that first bite.

How the McDonald’s Impatience Campaign Extends Across Formats

McDonald’s Paraguay continues to build on its existing “Impatient” platform with this campaign. Created by Oniria\TBWA and produced by Barraco Films, the work combines micro-spots and print advertising, with distribution across digital platforms, social media and print.

The idea translates naturally across these formats because the central behaviour can be explored through different situations without changing the underlying message. Each execution offers another example of customers giving in to their cravings before reaching their destination.

There is also a clear advantage in keeping the idea simple. The audience does not need a lengthy explanation to understand what is happening. The situations provide the context, the characters deliver the humour, and the McDonald’s order remains central to the story.

This approach gives the campaign a recognisable creative direction while allowing individual executions to have their own visual moments. It is an example of how a small observation about consumer behaviour can provide material for multiple advertising formats.

A Craving That Becomes the Story

The strength of Impatience lies in the connection between its insight and execution. Rather than telling customers that McDonald’s food is tempting, the campaign shows people behaving as though waiting to eat it is almost impossible.

That makes the product an active part of the storytelling. The packaging, the journey and the characters’ attempts to get to their food all contribute to the same idea.

For another example of McDonald’s using an everyday personal moment as the foundation for a film, explore McDonald’s First Drive. The two campaigns take different creative routes, but both place familiar human behaviour at the centre of their storytelling.

With Impatience, McDonald’s Paraguay finds humour in the short distance between collecting an order and actually eating it. Sometimes, getting the food home is the hardest part of the entire experience.

Credits
Agency: Oniria\TBWA
Client: McDonald’s
Chief Creative Officer: Camilo Guanes
Creative Director: Manuel Rolón
Creative Team: Diego López, Pere Escobar
Account Director: Lucía Arévalos
Project Managers: Monica Ferreira, Valeria Carmona, Luciana Medina
Digital Director: Milner Ayala
Content Managers: Maira Alcaraz, Josue Ortega
Community Manager: Tiziana Volta
Production Company: Barraco Films
Director: Sebastián Sorera
Director of Photography: Sebastián Sorera
Marketing Management: Fátima Mallorquín

Three Museum Cars Take on Taxi Duty

Instead of displaying the vehicles behind museum walls, Autoworld sent them into regular city traffic as working taxis.

Passengers could book a ride through the Taxis Verts app as they normally would. The surprise came when one of these historic vehicles arrived to pick them up. Members of the Autoworld team drove the cars and shared their stories with passengers during the journey.

The vehicles also carried distinctive Sputnik taxi signs, making their unusual role visible on the streets. The idea was simple: let the collection meet people where they already are, rather than asking people to come to the museum.

Three Cars, Three Different Histories

Each taxi brought its own story into the passenger experience.

The royal Cadillac had a particularly significant connection to Belgian history. According to Autoworld, it was used for the wedding of King Albert and Queen Paola in 1959, and again for the wedding of King Baudouin and Queen Fabiola in 1960.

The Ferrari Testarossa carried a different kind of cultural recognition. Its distinctive design made it one of the most recognisable Ferraris of its era, while its appearance in Miami Vice helped establish its place in popular culture.

The 1966 Ford Mustang represented another chapter of automotive history, associated with American performance and freedom.

Together, the three vehicles gave passengers more than an unusual ride. They turned a routine taxi journey into an opportunity to encounter the stories behind cars they might otherwise only see in a museum.

When the Collection Becomes the Outdoor Media

The strongest part of The Moving Museum is the way it uses the museum’s own collection as its medium. Instead of creating a conventional outdoor advertisement around the cars, Autoworld put the cars themselves into the city.

The taxi format gave the idea a practical reason to exist. These were not simply classic vehicles driving around for attention. They were taking bookings, collecting passengers and doing the job of ordinary taxis. That distinction made the surprise part of a real-world interaction.

The campaign’s OOH approach came from the movement of the vehicles themselves. Each journey brought the museum’s collection into public view, while the Sputnik taxi signs made the unusual vehicles recognisable as part of the activation.

A Museum Experience That Leaves the Building

The Moving Museum makes a strong case for taking a brand’s most distinctive assets beyond their usual setting. Autoworld did not need to recreate its collection in an advertising format. It had the real cars, their histories and the people who could tell those stories.

The result was an outdoor activation built around genuine objects and unexpected passenger encounters. For Autoworld, the city became an extension of the museum. For a passenger expecting an ordinary taxi, the journey became a brief encounter with automotive history.

Explore more OOH campaigns on Campaigns of the World.

Credits
Agency: Superkraft
Client: Autoworld
Client contact: Sebastien de Baere, Julie Daene
Managing partners: Lien Brouillard, Sam Lagaert
Creative Director: Koenraad Lefever
Strategic Director: Jef Raeman
Account team: Jana Maes, Luna Van Hoye
Creatives: Girbe Bogaerts, Yannick De Haes
Design Director: Caroline Vanneste
Design: Nicky Silversmet
Motion & Montage: Manpaard
DOP:Jurgen Geevels
Sound: Maarten Leemans

Why the Soundtrack Lands Last

The reasons are structural. Licensing a known song means clearing both the master and the publishing, often across several territories and media types, and every extra cutdown can reopen the negotiation. Library music is faster but hard to search, and two brands in the same category can easily end up on the same cue. Custom composition solves both issues, at the cost of time that most social and digital budgets simply do not have. So the soundtrack becomes the item everyone agrees to “sort later.” Later is usually the week of delivery.

From Creative Brief to First Draft

The first test for any of these tools is how well a written brief turns into a usable track. Artlist works from a text prompt describing genre, mood, tempo, instruments or even the story of the spot, and it can also take reference images, which is handy when an agency already has a mood board. Teams can choose instrumental or vocal output, write their own lyrics or let the system draft them, and set a video theme alongside the usual genre and mood controls.

Soundraw starts from structured choices rather than open prompts: mood, genre, instruments and length. Its tracks are assembled from samples and sounds made by the company’s own team of producers, which gives results a consistent, polished production feel. Beatoven.ai accepts text prompts as well as video and reference audio, and reads that input to propose mood-based background music.

For agencies that think in briefs rather than menus, Artlist’s prompt depth stands out. Its music AI generator also sits inside a platform that many production teams already use for licensed library tracks and footage, so a generated cue can live in the same project as the stock shots and sound effects it will sit under. Soundraw rewards producers who already know the genre and tempo they want, while Beatoven suits editors who prefer to describe a feeling and refine from there.

Cutting to Picture: Length, Edits and Stems

Generating a good track is half the job. The other half is making it fit a six-second bumper, a 15-second pre-roll and a 30-second hero film without sounding chopped.

Soundraw’s editor is the most hands-on of the three. Tracks are split into blocks, each with an energy bar that can be raised or lowered, and blocks can be added or removed. A Mixer Mode adjusts length, BPM and key, and lets editors mute instrument groups such as Melody, Backing, Bass, Drums and Fill, plus add fades at block edges. Beatoven offers timeline-aware editing that shifts mood across video segments, and it can output isolated stems, so a mixer can pull the drums under a voiceover or drop the piano for a quieter tag. Artlist lets users adjust duration and style, refine results and save songs to reuse their settings, which keeps a family of cutdowns sounding related. Music-led work shows why that matters: Spotify’s B2B campaign with FCB New York was a roughly four-minute music video staged inside Excel, and a piece like that depends on picture and track locking together exactly.

Licensing Language a Brand Team Can Sign Off

Legal review is where generated music either earns its place or stalls. Artlist says it claims no ownership of music generated on the platform and allows commercial use under its Terms of Use, describing tracks as licensed for ads and campaigns. Beatoven attaches a non-exclusive, perpetual license to each download that covers monetized videos and ads, while keeping ownership of the tracks itself and barring direct release to streaming services. It also trains its model on licensed catalogs from partners including Rightsify, Soundtrack Loops and Pro Sound Effects, and holds Fairly Trained certification. Soundraw markets its output as royalty-free, built on producer-made material.

Ownership is a separate question from permission to use. A Congressional Research Service summary notes that US copyright law requires human authorship, and that the Copyright Office treats prompts alone as insufficient control to make someone an author. Brands that want an exclusive sonic asset should plan for meaningful human arrangement on top of any generated base.

Keeping One Sound Across a Campaign

Consistency is where sonic branding pays off. A large Goldsmiths, University of London study with SoundOut, built on over 600,000 consumer responses, found that the right music lifted emotional response to a video by up to 16.4%. That effect compounds only if the audience hears a recognizable sound each time.

Each tool supports this in its own way. Soundraw’s key and BPM controls make it simple to regenerate variations that sit in the same harmonic space. Beatoven’s stems allow one master cue to be remixed for different placements. Artlist’s saved settings and reference images help a team return to the same brief months later and get a result that still belongs to the campaign.

Matching Each Tool to Cutdowns, Spots and Pitch Work

For fast social cutdowns, Soundraw’s block editor is hard to beat, since trimming a track to a precise length and energy curve takes minutes. For TV and online spots where a mixer needs control over individual layers, Beatoven’s stems and mood segments give the edit suite more to work with. For agency pitch work, where the brief is still a paragraph and a mood board, Artlist’s prompt and image inputs turn loose ideas into a credible demo quickly, with vocal options when a concept needs a sung line.

Many teams will end up mixing approaches. That is fine, as long as the licensing terms for each track are filed with the asset.

The bigger shift is timing. When a first musical draft costs minutes instead of days, sound can enter the process at the storyboard stage rather than the final week. Campaigns that make that move tend to sound more deliberate, and the soundtrack stops being the line item everyone dreads.

Spotify’s Spreadbeats work is the cleanest counterexample available. Turning an Excel media plan into a four-minute music video only sounds like a stunt until you consider that the team had to prove native spreadsheet functions could carry sound, motion and a narrative before anyone committed budget to it. That proof was a prototype. It answered a production question, not a taste question.

This piece is about that stage of the work, the unglamorous middle where a concept turns into something clickable. Usability, performance and the handoff to production are not downstream chores you deal with once the creative is locked. They are the constraints that decide which version of the idea survives.

What a Prototype Is Actually For

Teams get confused about prototypes because the word covers two very different objects. One is a mood piece, a clickable deck that exists to win approval in a meeting. The other is a load-bearing experiment designed to kill an assumption. Both have a place, but only the second one protects you later.

The useful question to ask before building anything is which assumption you are most afraid of. If the risk is comprehension, you need a rough thing in front of eight real users by Thursday. If the risk is technical, build the hardest interaction first and skip the visual polish entirely. A prototype that tests nothing is a very expensive drawing.

Scope follows from that. Fidelity should be uneven on purpose: beautiful where the question lives, ugly everywhere else. Teams have been known to spend two weeks matching typography on a flow whose core mechanic turned out to be impossible, and the typography did not soften the news.

Usability Shows Up Before the Polish Does

The reason to test early is not politeness, it is arithmetic. A misunderstanding caught in a rough prototype costs an afternoon. The same misunderstanding caught after production costs the campaign window, and campaign windows do not move for anybody.

Accessibility belongs in the same conversation, and it belongs there early, because retrofitting it is where budgets go to die. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines organize their success criteria under four principles, perceivable, operable, understandable and robust, at three conformance levels. Read that as a design brief rather than a compliance checklist and it starts shaping decisions you would otherwise make badly: contrast, focus order, whether your clever gesture has a keyboard equivalent, whether the motion you love has an off switch.

Interactive campaign work gets this wrong more often than product work does, partly because it ships fast and dies young. That is backwards reasoning. A short life span is exactly why the first impression has to land, since there is no version two coming to fix it.

Performance Is Part of the Idea, Not a Tax on It

Nothing flattens an interactive concept faster than a three-second wait. Google’s Core Web Vitals put real numbers on this, and they are worth memorizing: Largest Contentful Paint within 2.5 seconds, Interaction to Next Paint at 200 milliseconds or less, Cumulative Layout Shift held under 0.1, measured at the 75th percentile of page loads across mobile and desktop. Those thresholds are not aspirations, they are the line between an experience and an abandonment.

Prototyping on a fast laptop hides all of this, which is why the prototype should run once on something slow and throttled before anyone signs off. Weight is usually the culprit, and weight is usually a creative decision in disguise: the hero video, the custom font stack, the particle effect nobody notices in the background.

Media placement has its own physics. The IAB Tech Lab’s New Ad Portfolio guidelines moved standard units away from fixed pixel sizes toward aspect ratios and size ranges, built around LEAN principles of lightweight, encrypted, AdChoices supported and non-invasive advertising. If your concept assumes a fixed canvas, the prototype is where you find that out, not the week of launch.

Making the Handoff Survivable

The gap between a working prototype and a production build is where most teams lose time, because the prototype was never meant to be inherited. Somebody rebuilds it from scratch, interpretation drifts, and the thing that tested well is not quite the thing that ships.

Shared components narrow that gap. So does being honest about which parts of the prototype are disposable and which are the real implementation. Internal tooling built with governed vibe coding can take a lot of pressure off here, letting a team assemble the dashboards, approval flows and campaign admin screens that surround a launch without those becoming engineering projects of their own. The creative build then gets the engineering attention it deserves.

Documentation sounds dull and saves weeks. One page per interaction, written while the decision is fresh: what it does, what it must never do, what was already tried and rejected. Nobody reads it in week one. Everybody reads it in week four, when the person who built the mechanic has moved to another account.

Where the Craft Actually Lives

The best interactive campaigns rarely come from the biggest idea in the room. They come from the idea that survived contact with a browser, a slow phone and a production calendar, and came out the other side still recognizable. That survival is a skill, and it is mostly practiced at the prototype stage.

So move the hard questions forward. Build the risky part first, test it on real people and bad hardware, write down what you learned, and hand over something a developer can actually read. None of that is glamorous, and none of it will ever appear in a case study.

What appears in the case study is the campaign that worked, which is the same thing, arrived at honestly.

That challenge has shaped the evolution of display advertising. What began with relatively simple banner placements has expanded into a mix of formats, targeting methods and measurement tools. For advertisers, the decision is no longer just where to place an ad. It is also how the format affects the message, the audience and the experience of encountering it.

Banners Remain Part of the Advertising Landscape

Banner advertising helped establish the commercial web. Publishers could monetise their pages, while brands gained a direct way to present products and offers to online audiences. The format was straightforward: create a visual, place it on a website and give viewers a route to learn more.

The advertising landscape has since become more complex, but banners remain commercially significant. According to the IAB/PwC Internet Advertising Revenue Report for 2025, US display advertising revenue reached $81.6 billion, compared with $74.3 billion in 2024.

The category extends beyond traditional rectangular banners, encompassing other display formats as well. The figures therefore illustrate the scale of the broader market, rather than the performance of any one advertising format.

For creative teams, the continuing presence of banners also presents a familiar challenge. An ad must compete with the content surrounding it, and simply making a design more prominent does not guarantee that people will notice or remember it.

The Problem Is Not Always the Creative

People become familiar with the layouts of the websites and apps they use. Over time, they may learn to overlook areas that resemble advertisements, even when those placements contain information relevant to them. This behaviour is commonly known as banner blindness.

Research by the Nielsen Norman Group has examined how users ignore advertisements and content that looks promotional. The finding has practical implications for campaign design: a carefully produced creative can still be overlooked if its placement or presentation fails to engage the intended audience.

This does not make traditional banners obsolete. It means advertisers need to consider the relationship between the creative and its environment. A clear message, relevant offer and suitable placement may matter more than adding visual effects simply to attract attention.

It also helps explain why display advertising developed into a wider mix of formats. Different placements create different opportunities, but each comes with its own limitations.

Five Formats, Five Different Approaches

The main display formats are not interchangeable. Each changes how an advertisement appears and how the audience encounters it.

The distinction is important for creative development. A banner may need to communicate an idea quickly, while a video can give a product more room to tell a story. Rich media can invite interaction, but that interaction should contribute something useful rather than distract from the message.

Native advertising takes another approach by placing promotional content within a familiar browsing environment. Popunders, meanwhile, separate the destination from the page the user was viewing. These differences affect not only the media plan but also the way a campaign should be designed and evaluated.

Popunders and the Question of Traffic Quality

Popunder advertising offers a different way to present an advertiser’s destination. Instead of appearing as a unit within the current page, it typically opens a new tab or window after a qualifying interaction.

Advertisers evaluating popunder advertising can compare the format with other acquisition channels by looking at where visits originate, how people interact with the destination and whether those visits lead to meaningful actions.

The number of visits alone tells only part of the story. A campaign may generate substantial traffic without producing qualified leads, purchases or other intended outcomes. Landing-page relevance, audience targeting and placement quality all influence what that traffic is worth.

There is also a user-experience trade-off. A separate window or tab may bring a destination into view, but an unexpected interruption can frustrate visitors. Advertisers need to weigh the potential reach against the quality of the resulting interactions rather than assuming that greater visibility automatically produces better results.

Native Advertising Needs a Clear Editorial Boundary

Native advertising is designed to fit the context in which it appears. A placement might resemble a recommended article, a promoted listing or a sponsored story, allowing the creative to sit more naturally within a content feed.

That familiarity can make a placement relevant to its surroundings, but it also creates a responsibility. Readers should be able to distinguish paid advertising from independent editorial content. Matching a publication’s visual style should not mean disguising the commercial nature of the message.

For brands and publishers, the strongest approach combines contextual relevance with transparent labelling. The subject should make sense for the audience, the creative should communicate its purpose clearly, and the placement should respect the reader’s ability to recognise advertising.

This is particularly important for campaigns built around storytelling. A compelling headline or image may encourage someone to explore a message, but trust depends on being clear about who is presenting it and why.

Clicks Are Only the Beginning of Measurement

An advertisement can attract attention without producing a useful outcome. That is why campaign evaluation needs to go beyond impressions and clicks.

The appropriate metrics depend on what a campaign is intended to achieve. Brand awareness campaigns may focus on reach and exposure, while direct-response activity may prioritise conversions and acquisition costs.

Common measures include:

• Click-through rate (CTR): The proportion of impressions that result in clicks.
• Conversion rate: The proportion of relevant visits or interactions that lead to a desired action.
• Cost per acquisition (CPA): The cost of obtaining a specified conversion.
• Return on ad spend (ROAS): The revenue attributed to advertising relative to the advertising spend.
• Lead quality: How closely generated leads match the intended audience and business requirements.
• Customer lifetime value: The expected value of a customer over the relationship with the business.

These measures help explain why a format with fewer clicks can still contribute to a successful campaign. If its visitors are more likely to convert, it may deliver greater value than a placement that generates more activity but fewer meaningful results.

The key is to compare like with like. Campaign objectives, attribution methods and conversion definitions need to be consistent enough to support useful decisions.

Automation Has Changed the Media-Buying Process

Programmatic advertising has made it possible to buy and sell digital ad inventory through automated systems, including auctions that assess individual impressions against campaign criteria.

Depending on the platform and available data, advertisers can adjust bids, budgets and targeting across placements, devices, locations and other audience signals. This makes campaign management more flexible than relying on a fixed placement and leaving it unchanged throughout a campaign.

Automation, however, does not replace strategic judgement. Advertising systems optimise towards the objectives and signals they receive. If a campaign is measured against the wrong outcome, an automated system may increase activity without improving the result that matters to the business.

Creative quality, traffic sources and conversion performance still require attention. The technology can help manage delivery, but advertisers must decide what success means and whether the resulting activity supports that objective.

Attention Should Not Come at the Expense of Experience

Every advertising format involves a balance between visibility and the audience’s experience. Repeated exposure can become irritating, irrelevant messages can be ignored, and unexpected interruptions can affect how people perceive both a brand and the publisher carrying its advertising.

These considerations should be part of campaign planning from the outset. Advertisers need to assess whether a placement suits the message, whether the frequency is reasonable and whether the landing page delivers what the creative promises.

Publishers also have a role in deciding which formats fit their audiences. A placement that generates short-term activity may not be worthwhile if it undermines the quality of the browsing experience.

For creative teams, this is a reminder that an advertisement does not exist in isolation. Its impact depends partly on the environment in which people encounter it and what happens after they engage.

Choosing the Format That Fits the Idea

Display advertising has not progressed through a simple sequence in which every new format replaces the previous one. Banners, rich media, native placements, video and popunders continue to serve different purposes, with varying implications for creative development, delivery and measurement.

The useful question is not which format is universally best, but which one suits the campaign’s message, audience and objective. A simple banner may be sufficient for a clear reminder. A video may help explain a more complex idea. A native placement may provide a relevant route into sponsored content, while a popunder campaign requires particular attention to traffic quality and the browsing experience.

Choosing well means looking beyond visibility alone. The format should support the creative idea, the resulting interactions should be measured against a meaningful objective, and the campaign should respect the audience it is trying to reach.

As digital advertising continues to evolve, that combination of creative judgement, appropriate placement and meaningful measurement remains central to building campaigns that do more than generate impressions.

It is a familiar challenge in product marketing. Furniture makes the problem particularly clear, but the same gap between design and production can affect lighting, home accessories, appliances and other products.

Waiting for a physical sample is one option. Another is to develop the campaign visuals in 3D, using the information available during product development. The approach has its own demands, but it gives agencies another way to work when production schedules and marketing deadlines do not line up.

When the product isn’t ready

Traditional product photography depends on having something to photograph. Once a sample is available, a team can arrange the set, work with a photographer and stylist, and capture the product under controlled lighting.

The difficulty comes when a campaign needs to be developed before that point. A delayed sample can leave little time for production, particularly when the brief calls for several colours, configurations or formats.

CGI offers an alternative. A 3D artist can build a digital model from suitable CAD files, technical drawings and product specifications, then develop the scene and lighting around it. Material references help establish the intended appearance of the finish.

The quality of the result depends on the information available, the complexity of the product and the skill of the production team. Missing dimensions or unclear material specifications can create problems later, so the brief needs to be clear about what is confirmed and what is still subject to change.

More flexibility, with a few conditions

One advantage of building a product in 3D is the ability to develop different views and variations from the same model.

A modular sofa, for example, might need to appear in several arrangements or upholstery colours. If the model and materials have been set up appropriately, the team can explore those variations without arranging a separate physical shoot for each one.

The same principle applies to campaign environments. A room can be designed once and adjusted for different compositions, lighting conditions or formats. Selected assets can also be animated for short videos, provided the scope and production time allow for it.

That flexibility should not be confused with instant production. Complex materials, new geometry, additional camera angles and substantial changes to an animation can all require further work. Agencies should agree on the expected deliverables and revision process before production begins.

Briefing an external CGI team

Most creative agencies do not need to produce every part of a campaign in-house. Depending on the project, an external specialist may provide the modelling, rendering or animation while the agency leads the concept and client relationship.

A white-label CGI production partner can support this arrangement, with the scope of the partnership agreed between the agency and studio. Before work begins, both sides should be clear about responsibilities, delivery dates, revision limits, confidentiality and the rights associated with the finished assets.

The brief is where much of the work is won or lost. “Premium” or “aspirational” may describe the desired mood, but those words alone leave plenty of room for interpretation. References for lighting, camera angles, interior styling, composition and material appearance give the team something more concrete to work from.

Product information matters just as much. CAD files, dimensions, technical drawings, colour references and fabric samples can all help the studio understand what needs to be represented accurately. If a specification is provisional, identify it as such rather than allowing an assumption to become part of the final image.

Treat art direction as part of production

A technically accurate model does not automatically make a compelling campaign image. The room can feel sterile, the lighting can flatten the material, or the styling can distract from the product.

This is why agencies should remain closely involved in art direction, even when the rendering is handled externally. Decisions about framing, light, props, texture and atmosphere should support the original creative idea rather than simply make the image look polished.

Material accuracy deserves particular attention. Fabric can look different under different lighting conditions, and a digital texture may not fully capture the appearance of a physical finish. Scanned references and actual samples can help, but the result should still be checked against the approved specification.

When the first production sample becomes available, comparing it with the render can reveal differences that need correcting. It is better to resolve those details before final assets are approved for print or other fixed-format applications.

Plan the revisions before the first render

A CGI project needs room for review. The first set of images may reveal that the fabric looks too smooth, the room is too bright or the product needs to be shown from another angle.

Agencies should establish review milestones and agree on how feedback will be consolidated. It also helps to distinguish minor adjustments from changes that affect the underlying model or require new deliverables.

A realistic schedule accounts for the time needed to review the work, return consolidated comments and approve the final assets. A tight launch date is not a substitute for a workable production plan.

The brief should also cover the full range of required outputs. A hero image, a social crop, a product-page visual and an animated sequence may need different compositions or production work. Identifying those needs early reduces the risk of discovering a missing asset close to launch.

CGI and photography can work together

CGI does not make photography obsolete. A physical shoot can capture real people, natural interactions and the character of an actual space in ways that may be important to a campaign.

The two methods can also serve different stages of a launch. Rendered imagery may be useful while a product is still in development or when multiple approved configurations need to be shown. Photography can follow when samples are available and the campaign calls for real environments or people.

The right mix depends on the brief, the product, the available reference material, the budget and the delivery schedule. Neither approach is automatically the better choice for every campaign.

Four questions to ask before production starts

When a brief arrives before the product is ready, four questions help establish whether CGI is a practical option:

• What information is available? Confirm the CAD files, drawings, measurements, material samples and approved colour references.
• When will physical samples arrive? Build in time to check the renders against the finished product where necessary.
• Which variations are essential? Agree on the required configurations, colours, camera angles and formats before production begins.
• Who is responsible for art direction and approval? Establish who briefs the studio, consolidates feedback and signs off the final assets.

A product that is not yet available for photography does not necessarily have to stop a campaign from moving forward. With reliable product information, clear art direction and a realistic production plan, CGI can give agencies another way to develop launch visuals before the physical product is ready.

The important decision is not whether every campaign should use 3D. It is whether the method suits the product, the creative idea and the time available.

The Uniform Is Part of the Participation Problem

ASICS’ 2024 State of Mind Study highlighted the connection between physical activity during adolescence and mental wellbeing later in life. The brand also points to a troubling figure: 64% of UK girls drop out of sport before turning 16.

The campaign identifies school PE kit as one barrier worth addressing. Traditional uniforms can leave little room for personal preference, different body shapes, changing weather or the practical concerns that come with growing up. When clothing makes participation uncomfortable, the experience of sport can become less inviting.

According to the campaign research, 70% of girls said they would be more likely to take part in PE if their kit made them feel more comfortable, while only 12% were completely satisfied with what they currently wore. The research also found that 63% believed it was time to reimagine the PE kit. Together, these findings put the uniform itself under scrutiny.

ASICS The Undropped Kit Starts by Listening to Girls

ASICS developed the kit concept with Inclusive Sportswear, mental health charity Mind and input from more than 2,000 teenage girls across the UK through a co-creation and testing process. Focus groups, surveys and a school trial helped identify what students wanted from their PE clothing.

The resulting concept was designed around different body shapes, weather conditions and personal styles. Its central proposition is straightforward: girls should be able to concentrate on playing sport without their clothing becoming a source of discomfort or distraction.

The collaboration reflects the principles of Inclusive Sportswear, which places comfort, practicality, choice and personal expression at the centre of sportswear design. Rather than asking girls to adapt to a uniform that may not suit them, the campaign asks what the uniform should do for the people wearing it.

From Sportswear Design to a Wider Conversation

The campaign connects ASICS’ interest in physical activity and mental wellbeing with a practical issue in everyday school life. The PE kit becomes the tangible expression of a broader question about access: who feels comfortable enough to participate, and what could schools change to make that experience more welcoming?

Partner athlete and contributor Tess Howard MBE OLY brings a sporting perspective to the initiative. The involvement of Inclusive Sportswear, Mind and teenage participants also places lived experience alongside the design process.

The campaign invites schools and other decision-makers to reconsider the choices available to students. But a prototype and a persuasive campaign are not the same as widespread adoption. Its long-term value depends on whether schools can translate its principles into practical uniform choices that are comfortable, affordable and accessible to pupils.

The concept is not currently a retail product. ASICS presents it as a way to demonstrate what a school PE kit designed around girls’ needs could look like and to encourage broader change.

Rethinking What Girls Need to Play

ASICS The Undropped Kit makes a compelling case for looking beyond the obvious barriers to participation in sport. A PE uniform may seem like a small detail, but for the girls expected to wear it, comfort and choice can shape the experience of taking part. By involving teenage girls in the design process, ASICS turns their everyday frustrations into the starting point for a different approach.

The campaign’s most interesting move is to shift the question from why girls drop out to what might make staying in sport easier. That change in perspective gives the work its relevance, connecting a tangible design problem to a wider conversation about inclusion.

Whether the concept leads to lasting change will depend on what happens next: whether schools adopt more flexible kit options and whether girls feel the difference. For now, the campaign offers a useful reminder that participation is not only about encouraging people to play. It is also about removing the things that make playing harder than it needs to be.

Explore more ideas in Campaigns of the World’s Film and Video collection.

Credits
Brand: ASICS
Campaign: ASICS The Undropped Kit
Creative Agency: GUT Toronto
PR Agency: Golin Ketchum London
Partner Athlete & Contributor: Tess Howard MBE OLY
Pilot Testing Partner: Burnley High School, UK.

The Singapore-based independent brewer did not need to produce those films itself. Instead, it gave people the instructions to make them. The idea put a simple question at the centre of its advertising: if anyone can create an impressive-looking commercial with AI, why spend a fortune making one?

Brewlander A.I. Irresponsibly Turns Advertising Into a Creative Tool

Beer advertising often relies on polished visuals, cinematic films and celebrity appearances to make a brand stand out. For an independent brewer, matching that level of production spending can be difficult.

Brewlander chose to challenge the expectation rather than compete on the same terms. Its campaign used generative AI to turn the production process into something the audience could take part in.

The brand placed detailed prompts across outdoor media and print. People could type the instructions into text-to-video platforms or photograph them to use later. The prompts were designed to help users generate their own cinematic beer ads.

This made the media itself part of the idea. A billboard was no longer just a surface carrying a message. It became a starting point for creating content.

The Audience Made the Commercials

The interesting part of A.I. Irresponsibly is the change in roles between the brand and its audience.

Brewlander supplied the creative direction through its prompts, while participants used AI tools to produce the films. Rather than commissioning a traditional series of commercials, the brand invited people to make their own versions.

This approach has a useful precedent in other forms of AI advertising. In Heinz A.I. Ketchup, AI-generated imagery became the basis of a campaign built around how people and artificial intelligence picture the familiar product. Brewlander takes a different route, using AI not just to generate advertising assets but to invite people into the production process itself.

The technology also served a specific brand position. Brewlander wanted to invest its resources in brewing better beer rather than spending heavily on advertising production.

People could experience that argument rather than simply read it in a brand message. The prompts gave them a practical way to see how AI could change the process of making a commercial.

Why the Idea Fits Brewlander

For a smaller brewer competing against global beer brands, trying to outspend established players would be a difficult strategy to sustain.

A.I. Irresponsibly offered another way to compete for attention. It used a shift in technology to make the difference in production budgets part of the creative concept.

The campaign also avoided treating participation as an afterthought. The prompts were built into the media, giving people a direct way to move from seeing an ad to making one.

According to the campaign case study, participants who generated films could unlock exclusive discounts. This connected the creative activity with a potential purchase, rather than leaving it as an isolated social media stunt.

The broader principle is not entirely new. BT Sport’s Unscripted campaign used AI and sports data to build a campaign around the unpredictability of football. Both examples show how technology can help shape the central creative idea rather than simply provide a new production tool.

For Brewlander, the distinction was especially relevant. The brand was not trying to prove that it could produce a bigger beer commercial than its competitors. It was making a case for why it did not need to.

The Reported Results Behind Brewlander A.I. Irresponsibly

The campaign case study reports a 32% increase in brand awareness and more than 500 AI-created ads. It also estimates that Brewlander avoided $5 million in production costs by replacing traditional film production with audience-created content.

The case study further reports that the discount mechanic contributed to increased trial and repeat purchase, alongside improvements in consideration and positive sentiment. However, it does not provide the underlying research methodology, baseline figures or a detailed breakdown of the cost calculation on the published page.

These numbers should therefore be understood as campaign-reported results rather than independently verified measurements.

The more than 500 generated ads offer an indication of the participation the campaign was designed to encourage. The awareness and commercial figures address different outcomes and would need supporting measurement details to establish the scale and attribution of the reported impact.

The campaign was also recognised at The One Show 2026, receiving a Bronze Pencil in the Integrated / Omnichannel Campaign category. The official One Show case study provides the campaign background, execution details, results and credits.

The Real Test Is What People Choose to Create

Brewlander A.I. Irresponsibly makes a stronger point about advertising than simply showing what AI can produce. It changes who gets to make the commercial. The brand supplies the direction, but the audience gets to interpret it.

That shift is particularly relevant for an independent brewer competing in a category where polished films and familiar advertising codes can demand significant investment. Instead of treating its smaller production ambitions as a limitation, Brewlander made them part of the idea.

There is a trade-off, though. Giving people the tools to make beer ads does not guarantee that every result will be distinctive, memorable or recognisably Brewlander. The creative challenge is no longer just producing the film. It is giving people a prompt worth using and a reason to associate what they create with the brand.

That is where the campaign’s success should ultimately be judged. The reported volume of AI-generated ads suggests participation, while awareness and commercial impact require their own evidence. Making content easier to produce is a useful starting point. Making the brand harder to forget is the bigger achievement.

Explore more creative work in Film and Video Campaigns.

Credits
Brand: Brewlander
Campaign: Brewlander A.I. Irresponsibly
Agency: BLKJ Havas Pte Ltd, Singapore
Art Director: Casimir Simon
Chief Creative Officers: Joji Jacob, Sachin Talwalkar
Copywriters: Guilherme Machado, Anette Lok
Executive Creative Directors: Guilherme Machado, Khalid Osman
Strategy Director: Skanda Lokeshwaran
Business Director: Vivien Foo
CEO: Rowena Bhagchandani

This is a familiar problem in influencer marketing. Brands spend time finding potential partners but often rush the first conversation. A generic pitch gives creators little reason to respond, especially when the proposed work, budget, and expectations are unclear.

Better outreach starts with understanding the person receiving the message and offering something worth considering.

Show That You Have Done Your Research

Personalization means more than adding a creator’s name or mentioning a recent post. It means explaining why their work is relevant to the campaign.

A home fitness brand, for example, could contact a creator who reviews equipment for small apartments and explain how its foldable dumbbells might interest that audience. The connection is specific, and the creator can see why the brand approached them.

Follower counts alone rarely tell the whole story. A smaller creator whose content closely matches a product may be a better partner than a larger account with little connection to it.

Research takes time, so brands should build a shortlist around genuine relevance rather than sending the same message to hundreds of accounts. Personalization will not guarantee a reply, but it gives the conversation a more credible starting point.

Make the Offer Clear

Creators should not have to exchange several emails just to understand what a brand wants.

A good first message should explain the product, the proposed content, the compensation, the timeline, and any important creative requirements. It need not read like a contract, but the basics should be easy to find.

Be particularly clear about payment. If the campaign has a fixed budget, state that early. A creator can then decide whether the fee suits the work involved.

Gifting also needs a clear explanation. Sending a product without expecting content is different from asking someone to produce a video in exchange for it. Affiliate arrangements may work for some campaigns, but they are not automatically a substitute for paid work.

The right offer depends on the creator, the campaign, and the effort required. Being upfront saves time on both sides.

Write an Email That Sounds Personal

Consider a home fitness brand approaching a creator who makes videos about exercising in small apartments.

A first message could read:

“Hi Mia,

I saw your video about setting up a workout space in a small apartment, especially your point about equipment that is easy to put away.

We make foldable adjustable dumbbells and are planning a paid video collaboration for March. We’d like to discuss one video, with room for you to demonstrate the product in your own style. We have a set budget and can share the brief and fee upfront.

Would you be interested in taking a look?”

The message explains why the creator was chosen, what the brand is offering, and what happens next. It does not assume the creator will be interested or dictate what they should say about the product.

The goal is to make the opportunity easy to assess, not to find a template that guarantees a response.

Follow Up Without Pestering

If an email goes unanswered, one brief follow-up is reasonable. The original message may have been overlooked, or the creator may not have had time to consider it.

The follow-up can clarify the proposed work or share a useful detail about the campaign. Repeating the same pitch several times adds little value.

After that, it is usually better to leave the decision with the creator. They may be busy, the timing may be wrong, or the offer may not suit their audience. Repeated reminders can make a brand look intrusive rather than persistent.

Teams should also respect requests not to be contacted again and follow applicable privacy and marketing rules.

Use Tools to Keep Conversations Organized

A spreadsheet may be enough for a team working with a handful of creators. As campaigns grow, however, it becomes easier to lose track of replies, agreed fees, deadlines, and follow-ups.

Two colleagues might contact the same creator, or an important response could sit unnoticed in someone’s inbox. A shared record of conversations and commitments helps prevent these mistakes.

For larger programmes, an influencer outreach platform can help teams manage creator emails and follow-ups in one place.

Software can reduce administrative work, but it cannot replace the judgment needed to choose the right creator or write a relevant pitch. Teams still need to check their messages, maintain accurate records, and stop contacting people who have declined.

Discuss Disclosure Before Production

Disclosure should be discussed before a creator begins making content, not introduced as a last-minute requirement.

In the United States, Federal Trade Commission guidance explains that creators may need to disclose material connections with brands, including payments and free products. Disclosures should be clear and easy for audiences to notice.

Brands working in other markets should check the relevant local rules and platform requirements. The campaign brief should explain what disclosure is expected and who is responsible for checking it before publication.

Agreeing on these details early helps both parties avoid preventable revisions later.

Make the First Campaign Worth Repeating

A good first collaboration depends on more than the content itself. Brands need to respect the agreed scope, give useful feedback, meet deadlines, and pay according to the agreed terms.

Problems arise when deliverables keep expanding, approvals are delayed, or creators are asked to make repeated changes that were never discussed at the start.

A clear brief helps both sides understand the work, deadlines, usage rights, and approval process. When a project runs smoothly, a future collaboration becomes easier to consider because both parties know what working together involves.

An ongoing partnership is never guaranteed, but a professional first experience gives it a better foundation.

Give Creators a Reason to Reply

No email template can guarantee a response. The creator may be busy, the offer may not fit, or the budget may fall short of their expectations.

Brands can control how they approach people: research creators carefully, explain the offer clearly, follow up respectfully, and honour their commitments.

The first message does not need to sell the entire company. It needs to explain why a conversation between the brand and that particular creator might be worthwhile.

The requirements are being introduced in stages. While large companies and intermediate-sized enterprises have entered the issuing phase, small and medium-sized businesses and micro-enterprises are scheduled to follow in September 2027. Understanding the distinction is important for brands that work with independent creators in France.

What Changed in September 2026?

Under France’s reform, businesses subject to the rules must be able to receive electronic invoices through an approved platform from 1 September 2026. Large companies and intermediate-sized enterprises must also issue invoices electronically from that date.

The issuing requirement extends to SMEs and micro-enterprises from 1 September 2027. The reform therefore affects businesses of different sizes, although their obligations do not all begin simultaneously.

A compliant electronic invoice is not simply a PDF attached to an email. In-scope invoices must be exchanged through the prescribed system in an accepted structured format, such as UBL, CII or Factur-X.

Approved platforms also support the transmission of required invoice and transaction data to the French tax administration. Businesses should confirm their own obligations and choose a platform listed by the relevant authorities.

Why Creator Payments Need Attention

Influencer campaigns often involve multiple independent professionals, from established influencers to smaller creators, photographers and freelance production teams. Each relationship can require supplier information, contracts, invoice checks and payment records.

For a brand managing dozens or hundreds of collaborations, these processes can become difficult to coordinate. The e-invoicing reform adds another consideration: whether each transaction falls within the domestic B2B invoicing framework or another reporting category.

A French business paying a French creator for professional services may have a domestic B2B transaction, depending on the parties’ circumstances and the nature of the service. Cross-border arrangements need separate assessment because their invoicing and reporting treatment can differ.

The practical priority is to understand the transaction before deciding how it should be documented and reported.

What Micro-Entrepreneur Creators Should Know

Many independent creators in France operate under the micro-entrepreneur regime. Some benefit from the franchise en base de TVA, a VAT exemption available subject to applicable conditions.

However, VAT exemption should not automatically be interpreted as an exemption from every requirement under the invoicing reform. The applicable obligations depend on the creator’s status, the transaction and the relevant rules.

From 1 September 2027, SMEs and micro-enterprises are scheduled to enter the issuing phase. Brands should prepare for this transition by reviewing supplier records, confirming invoicing arrangements and establishing a process for resolving rejected or incorrectly routed invoices.

These checks are particularly important when a campaign involves a large number of independent suppliers who may have different levels of familiarity with electronic invoicing.

E-Invoicing and E-Reporting: The Difference

Although the terms are related, they describe different obligations.

• E-invoicing covers qualifying domestic B2B transactions and requires invoices to be exchanged through the prescribed electronic system.
• E-reporting covers specified transactions outside the domestic e-invoicing scope, including relevant cross-border transactions and certain sales to consumers.

The distinction matters when brands work with creators established in different countries. A payment should not be classified solely on the basis of the creator’s location or business structure. The parties, transaction and applicable tax rules all need to be considered.

Penalties and the Transition Period

France’s tax administration has established penalties for certain failures to comply with the reform. The French Ministry of Finance has also announced that penalties will not be imposed during 2026 as businesses transition to the new system.

That temporary approach does not remove the need to prepare for subsequent obligations. Businesses should consult current official guidance for the applicable deadlines, penalty provisions and any changes to implementation arrangements.

With the next issuing phase scheduled for September 2027, the transition period provides an opportunity to identify documentation gaps and resolve operational problems before the requirements expand.

Reviewing Creator Contracts and Invoicing Arrangements

Electronic invoicing is only one part of the compliance picture. France also has legislation governing commercial influence activities.

Under the rules implementing Article 8 of Law No. 2023-451, a written contract is required when remuneration and benefits in kind for an influencer, from an advertiser during the same year and for services pursuing the same promotional objective, reach or exceed €1,000 excluding tax.

Brands should review contract documentation alongside their invoicing procedures. French influencer regulations are a separate consideration and should not be treated as a substitute for tax guidance.

Marketing, procurement and finance teams should coordinate their processes for supplier onboarding, contracts, invoice approval and payment records. Businesses using self-billing should also verify that the arrangement meets the applicable requirements and that invoices are processed through the correct electronic system.

Can a Merchant of Record Simplify Creator Payments?

A merchant of record can consolidate aspects of a payment workflow by acting as a contractual counterparty and handling specified invoicing and payout tasks. Depending on the arrangement, this may reduce the number of direct supplier relationships a brand needs to administer.

However, consolidation does not automatically eliminate every invoicing or reporting obligation. The outcome depends on the actual contractual relationships, the parties’ establishment and tax status, and the nature of the services supplied.

Brands evaluating this model should establish who invoices whom, how the creator’s work is documented, which reporting obligations apply and which responsibilities remain with the brand. Claims about compliance automation or administrative savings should be assessed against the actual service and supported by evidence.

Looking Beyond France

France is part of a wider shift towards digital tax administration. The European Union’s VAT in the Digital Age package was adopted in March 2025 and introduces changes in stages, including digital reporting for cross-border B2B transactions from July 2030. Further milestones extend to 2035.

For brands operating creator campaigns across several markets, this means invoicing processes may need to accommodate different national rules and implementation schedules. A workflow that meets one country’s requirements should not be assumed to satisfy those of another.

Conclusion

France’s e-invoicing reform makes invoice readiness an important operational consideration for brands working with independent creators. The first phase began in September 2026, while the issuing requirement for SMEs and micro-enterprises is scheduled for September 2027.

Brands should use the transition period to review supplier information, invoicing workflows, contract documentation and the distinction between domestic e-invoicing and cross-border reporting. Payment platforms and merchant-of-record arrangements may help organise these processes, but their benefits and compliance implications depend on the underlying transaction.

Preparing early gives marketing and finance teams time to address documentation gaps and establish reliable procedures before the next phase takes effect.

The idea addresses a challenge identified by the company: plant-based dyes can lose their colour and associated properties without binding chemicals, making them difficult to use in mass production.

How AIZOME ULTRA Textile Dyeing Technology Uses Ultrasound

According to AIZOME’s press release, more than 1,500 synthetic chemicals are still used in textile dyeing, with potential consequences for workers, wearers and the environment. The company argues that conventional approaches to binding colour create challenges for plant-based alternatives.

AIZOME ULTRA™ uses ultrasound instead of conventional synthetic chemical binders. According to the company, sound waves operating at 52.5 kHz underwater set plant particles in motion, helping bind them to cotton fibres.

AIZOME describes the dyeing stage as taking between 60 and 90 minutes, with repeated applications of ultrasound. The wider manufacturing process can take about a year, the company says, because it monitors organic quality from farm to finished fabric.

The company presents this method as a way to retain plant-derived colour and the properties associated with the plants used. The supplied press release does not include independent test results establishing the permanence of the colour or comparing the process with conventional dyeing methods.

A Traditional Japanese Dyeing Method, Reworked

AIZOME takes its name from aizome, a Japanese plant-based dyeing tradition associated with natural indigo.

According to the company’s press release, indigo was historically valued for properties associated with wound healing, including its use in Samurai armour. The company describes the rise of synthetic dyes as a turning point in the decline of traditional aizome.

AIZOME ULTRA™ applies ultrasound to this plant-based approach. Rather than relying on conventional synthetic binders, the process aims to help plant-derived colour attach to cotton through physical action.

The practical question is whether the method can deliver consistent colour and durability at commercial scale. Those outcomes would need to be assessed through testing of the finished textiles and the production process.

What Happens to the Wastewater?

AIZOME says the wastewater produced by its process retains benefits associated with the medicinal plants used in dyeing. The supplied press release does not provide wastewater test results or identify which properties remain after processing.

This distinction matters when evaluating environmental claims. The use of plant-derived ingredients does not, by itself, establish that wastewater is harmless. Its composition and potential effects require appropriate testing.

The same caution applies to broader environmental benefits. The company’s description explains the intended approach, but does not provide comparative data establishing the process’s overall environmental performance.

The Proposed Healthcare Applications

AIZOME ULTRA™ is also presented as a way to bring plant-derived properties into everyday textiles. The company identifies possible applications including bedsheets intended to help heal wounds, T-shirts designed to reduce stress and underwear intended to ease menstrual pain.

AIZOME’s press release states that its technology has been validated by the University of Cambridge and recognised by the National Eczema Association as an innovation that improves quality of life for people with sensitive skin. The release does not detail the validation methods or specify the scope of that recognition.

The company also states that its medical benefits were approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2023. The supplied release does not identify the specific authorisation, product or medical indication, so the scope of this regulatory claim remains unclear.

These proposed applications should be distinguished from the dyeing technology itself. The presence of plant-derived compounds in a textile does not, on its own, establish that the finished product can treat a medical condition. Each health claim requires evidence appropriate to the product and its intended use.

A Different Approach to Plant-Based Textile Dyeing

AIZOME reports that more than 3,000 tonnes of fabric have been produced using its technology and that 2.4 million people have benefited. These are company-reported figures; the supplied press release does not explain how the beneficiary number was calculated or provide independent production records.

The company also reports receiving substantial investment and international media attention. Partnerships with healthcare institutions, fashion brands and cosmetics producers are described as underway.

AIZOME ULTRA textile dyeing technology focuses on changing how plant-derived colour is applied to cotton, rather than changing the colour source alone. Ultrasound is central to the company’s approach to plant-based textile dyeing.

Whether the technology delivers measurable environmental improvements and the proposed healthcare benefits depends on evidence specific to those outcomes. For now, the project presents a patented alternative to conventional synthetic chemical binders, with further questions about its performance and wider benefits requiring their own evidence.

Explore more technology campaigns on Campaigns of the World.

Credits
Campaign: AIZOME ULTRA™ Textile Dyeing Technology
Brand: AIZOME
Advertising Agency: Serviceplan Group
Production Company: off studios
Art Directors: Camille Nizet, Tanvi Phalak, Rohil Borole, Kai West Schlosser
Art Editor: Mike Friedland
Brand Design Director: Oliver Thellmann
CEO & Founders: Michel May, Misa May, Johannes Auffermann
Chief Creative Officer: Alex Schill
Cinematographers: Tom Kubik, Lucas Bergmüller
Colourist: Mike Friedland
Composer: Benjamin Gebert
Copywriters: Shruthi Subramanian, Taro Taniwaki, Sandra Valencia
Creative Directors: Naho Kosukegawa, Dennis Fritz
Creative Producer: Kevin Riedl
Designers: Arlinda Shabani, Andrea Da Silva
Directors of Photography: Tom Kubik
Director of Production: Lucas Bergmüller
Executive Creative Directors: Franz Röppischer, Lorenz Langgartner, Hagen Fiedler
Film Producer: Simon Mairhofer
Head of Audio: Benedikt Dorn
Interns: Ana Madalena Marques, Rafter Manguiat, Flavia Conti, Katie Eugster, Ani Barbakadze, Thomas Disanzo, Nareg Boyadjian
Junior Art Director: Michał Kuśmierz
Junior Motion Designer: Margarita Nikolajeva
Motion Designer: Nicolai Kovács
Post Producer: Felicitas Stahnke
Senior Developers: Timm Reiter, Stefan Schröder
Senior Motion Designer: Gergely Kozma
Sound Designer: Benedikt Dorn
Technology Lead: Malte Bender
Web Designers: Arlinda Shabani, Andrea Da Silva
Film Production: off studios
Post-Production Company: nhb next
Web Development: Astral Kreativ
Brand Partnerships Director: Megan Powers
Chief Executive Officer: Johannes Auffermann
Fundraising Director: Ivana Radovanovic
Producers: Simon Mairhofer, Kevin Riedl

The changes address different stages of brand advertising, from deciding when an ad should run to understanding how people engage with video content over time. Here is what each update introduces and what advertisers need to know.

Ads Super Burst Reserves a Concentrated Advertising Window

Ads Super Burst is a new advertising option that allows brands to reserve a campaign window lasting between three and 24 hours. It is designed for occasions when timing matters, such as a product launch, an awards night or the opening weekend of a sports season.

Advertisers can plan bookings through Meta’s Reach Planner, which provides estimated reach and pricing for their selected dates. The product also offers category exclusivity, preventing another advertiser in the same category from booking the same window.

Meta says Ads Super Burst campaigns have guaranteed delivery tied to the estimates provided through Reach Planner. This gives advertisers a way to plan concentrated exposure around a specific moment rather than spreading a campaign across a longer period.

According to Meta, advertisers testing the format over the preceding months recorded a median 2.9 percentage-point lift in ad recall and a 0.6 percentage-point lift in intent. Each campaign flight reached a median of 34 million people, equivalent to 14% of the US adult online audience in a single day, according to the company’s figures.

These are results reported by Meta from early campaigns, not guaranteed performance benchmarks for every advertiser. Ads Super Burst is moving towards general availability in October 2026 through a phased rollout.

First Impression Ads Tests the First Advertising Position in Facebook Feed

Meta is testing First Impression Ads in the United States, giving one brand per day the opportunity to appear as the first ad someone sees when opening the Facebook app and encountering Feed.

The placement is designed around prominence. Rather than competing with other advertisements further down the feed, a brand gets the first advertising position. Meta says advertisers have asked for this type of placement for years, and the company is now testing the product in response to that demand.

The test remains limited, with just one brand per day. Meta has not announced broad availability in the supplied announcement, so advertisers should not assume they can currently book the placement.

Reels Trending Ads Expands Its Content and Targeting Options

Reels Trending Ads is an existing product that lets businesses place advertisements immediately after the most-watched and most culturally relevant Reels on Facebook and Instagram. Meta expanded access to the product to all advertisers in 2025 and is now adding more ways to select the cultural moments surrounding a campaign.

Advertisers can choose from 15 always-on standard topics. New categories include Home & Garden and Spanish-language content, alongside seasonal line-ups built around occasions such as holidays and the start of football and basketball seasons.

Meta is also expanding the product’s targeting capabilities. Custom audience exclusions are planned for later in 2026, giving advertisers another way to control who they reach through campaigns using Reels Trending Ads.

The company reports that campaigns incorporating the product recorded an increase of more than five percentage points in action intent compared with control groups that had not been exposed to the campaigns. Meta also reported an incremental five percentage-point lift in unaided brand awareness.

These findings are based on Meta’s reported campaign results. They do not establish that every advertiser will achieve the same improvements, and the announcement does not provide enough methodological detail to independently assess the results.

Aggregated View Time Looks at Attention Across Multiple Exposures

Meta is also testing Aggregated View Time, a product designed to measure and optimise the total time someone spends with a brand over a week, rather than evaluating each video impression separately.

The idea reflects how people consume short-form video. Someone might see a brand for two seconds in a feed, encounter it for another second the following day and watch for two more seconds later in the week. Aggregated View Time is intended to consider those interactions together.

Meta says its research found that five seconds of accumulated attention over a week drove 32% more offline sales than a single, continuous five-second view. The company also cites independent industry research that found accumulated viewing time could predict outcomes better than focusing on one long view.

These findings concern the relationship between accumulated attention and sales outcomes. They should not be interpreted as proof that repeated exposure alone causes higher sales in every campaign.

Aggregated View Time remains in an early alpha testing phase. Meta describes it as an approach it is still developing, rather than a fully available measurement product.

More Advertising Options, but Attention Still Has to Be Earned

The four updates serve different purposes. Ads Super Burst lets advertisers reserve a concentrated campaign window. First Impression Ads tests a premium position at the start of Facebook Feed. Reels Trending Ads expands the topics and targeting choices available for contextual placements. Aggregated View Time explores how attention accumulates across multiple video encounters.

For media planners, these changes create additional ways to organise exposure around a campaign objective. For creative teams, however, the underlying challenge remains the same: securing a placement is not the same as earning attention.

A reserved window can help a brand show up at a relevant moment, but it cannot make an uninteresting message memorable. A first-position ad offers prominence, while Reels Trending Ads provides more control over the content surrounding a placement. Neither removes the need for a strong creative idea that gives people a reason to engage.

This is also why the relationship between media planning and creative execution matters. Campaigns such as Volvo XC40’s Drive-In Movies show how a brand can build an idea around an experience and extend it across digital platforms. The lesson is not that every campaign needs a premium placement, but that the placement works best when the creative gives people something worth remembering.

The availability of Meta’s new products also varies. Ads Super Burst is moving towards general availability through a phased rollout, First Impression Ads is being tested in the United States, and Aggregated View Time remains in alpha. Advertisers should confirm access and product terms before including these options in their media plans.

Meta’s latest updates offer brands more control over campaign timing, placement and the measurement of video attention. Their longer-term value will depend on whether these tools help advertisers connect with the right audiences and create work that people remember. Explore more examples in Campaigns of the World’s digital campaigns collection.

Creative agencies handle a mix of information that clients would rather keep private. There are advertising accounts with access to live budgets, social media profiles, unreleased campaign ideas, product launches and presentations that have not yet been approved. Keeping this material safe is part of managing the client relationship, even when nobody on the team has a formal IT role.

The weak points are often found in everyday working habits rather than sophisticated attacks.

When Everyone Uses the Same Login

Sharing a password can seem harmless when a small team is trying to get a campaign out on time. The trouble starts when somebody changes roles, leaves the agency or needs to be removed from a project.

With a shared login, it may be difficult to know who made a change. Resetting the password can also leave the rest of the team locked out until everyone receives the new credentials.

Where platforms allow it, each team member should have their own account and only the permissions they need. A designer working on campaign assets rarely needs the same access as someone managing advertising spend. Keeping those responsibilities separate makes mistakes easier to trace and access easier to withdraw.

A password manager can help teams avoid reused passwords and share credentials securely when individual accounts are not available. Two-factor authentication adds another layer of protection if a password is stolen.

Remote Work Needs More Than a Secure Wi-Fi Connection

Agency work does not always happen at a desk in the office. A strategist might review a campaign from an airport lounge, while an account manager checks an advertising dashboard from a hotel.

Public Wi-Fi is not automatically unsafe, but unfamiliar networks and fake hotspots can expose users to risks. Staff should verify network names, avoid suspicious login pages and keep their devices and applications updated.

A business VPN can encrypt traffic between a device and the VPN server, helping protect data as it travels across a network. It is one option for agencies whose teams regularly work remotely, although it cannot prevent phishing, malware or unauthorised access caused by stolen credentials.

The bigger question is whether the agency has clear rules for accessing client systems outside the office. Employees should know which devices and tools they can use, how to report suspicious activity and whom to contact if an account behaves unexpectedly.

The Problem With Unreleased Campaign Files

A draft advertisement sent to the wrong person can cause an awkward conversation. An unreleased product film or confidential pitch deck reaching the public can create a much bigger problem for the client.

Email attachments and open sharing links are easy to use, which is why they can become the default for moving files between teams. But once a file has been downloaded or a link has been forwarded, controlling its distribution becomes harder.

Agencies should keep working files in approved project spaces and give access only to people who need it. Where available, sign-in requirements and expiry dates can help limit who can open shared links. Sensitive files should not sit indefinitely in personal drives or folders that everyone in the agency can access.

It also helps to agree on a single location for approved artwork and final deliverables. This reduces the chance of a client receiving an outdated version or a team member accidentally sharing material that was never cleared for release.

Freelancers Need an Exit Plan Too

Freelancers and specialist production teams are part of normal agency life. They may need access to a client’s social account, a shared folder or a project management tool for only a few weeks.

That access should have an end date. When a project wraps up, someone should check which accounts, folders and platforms were shared and remove permissions that are no longer required. The same review should happen when an employee leaves or moves to another account.

This is easy to overlook during a busy handover, especially when several campaigns are running at once. A simple offboarding checklist makes it a routine task rather than something the team remembers only when a problem arises.

Have a Plan for When Something Goes Wrong

Even careful teams make mistakes. Someone may send a file to the wrong recipient, lose a laptop or discover an unfamiliar login to a client account.

The first response matters. Agencies should know who can secure the affected account, revoke access, contact the relevant platform and assess what information may have been exposed. They should also know who is responsible for informing the client when necessary.

Backups are worth checking before they are needed. Keeping protected copies of important project files separately from the main working environment can help an agency recover from accidental deletion, hardware failure or ransomware. A backup that has never been tested is not much reassurance.

Client Trust Is Part of the Job

Clients may never ask how an agency manages permissions or stores its working files. That does not make those details unimportant. When a team is entrusted with an advertising account or a campaign that has not yet launched, the responsibility extends beyond producing good creative work.

The practical steps are straightforward: stop relying on shared logins, review access when projects end, control how files are distributed and make sure everyone knows what to do when something goes wrong.

These habits will not eliminate every security risk, but they can prevent avoidable mistakes and make it easier to respond when problems occur. For an agency, that is part of looking after the work and the relationship behind it.

Created for World Mental Health Day 2026, the GymNation Worry Bench campaign brings a mental health conversation onto the gym floor. Instead of putting the message on a poster, the brand has made the equipment itself the talking point. The official GymNation campaign announcement provides further details about the activation.

The Weights Carry More Than Numbers

The campaign takes its words from a GymNation survey of 2,000 members across the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. According to the brand, concerns about the future ranked highest, at 21%. Imposter syndrome followed at 17%, while unhealthy comparisons accounted for 11% and doom scrolling for 4%.

These responses have been turned into inscriptions on actual weight plates, arranged across four weight categories.

The 20kg plates carry “The Future” and “Imposter Syndrome”. The 15kg plates feature “My To-Do List”, “Comparing Myself to Others” and “Never Enough”. At 10kg, the worries include “Starting Over”, “Loneliness” and “Losing My Job”. The 5kg plates carry “Rent”, “My Inbox” and “Doom Scrolling”.

The phrases need little explanation. Most people know what it feels like to have too much on their to-do list or to compare their progress with someone else’s. Seeing those thoughts stamped onto gym equipment makes them harder to overlook.

A Mental Health Campaign Built Into the Equipment

The idea connects physical weight with mental pressure through a simple visual detail rather than a long explanation. Members encounter the message while doing something they already came to the gym to do.

The weight categories give the installation a clear structure, too. Heavier plates carry concerns such as the future and imposter syndrome, while lighter plates feature everyday pressures such as rent and doom scrolling. This is the campaign’s creative classification of worries, not a clinical measure of their seriousness.

For an OOH-led campaign, the execution has a natural advantage. It belongs to the environment where people encounter it, and the message can be understood at a glance. GymNation does not need to interrupt the workout to introduce a separate advertising message. The equipment does the talking.

The connection between fitness and mental wellbeing has appeared in other campaigns as well. Reebok’s #BeMoreHuman campaign explored a broader understanding of strength, extending the conversation beyond physical performance.

From Unloading Weights to Naming Worries

The Worry Bench continues an idea GymNation explored in its 2025 World Mental Health Day activation. That campaign removed weights from gym floors to encourage members to unload their worries.

The 2026 version takes the idea in another direction. Rather than removing the weights, GymNation has given them words. The earlier activation used absence to make a point; the Worry Bench uses the equipment itself.

GymNation Chief Marketing Officer Rory McEntee says the intention is to bring everyday worries to the front of people’s minds and encourage greater awareness of what they carry into a workout.

The brand also reports that 52% of surveyed members focus their gym routine on reducing stress and anxiety and improving their mental health. More than one in four said they had quit exercising because of a low mood.

These findings give the campaign a clear connection to its audience. It addresses people who may already understand the value of exercise but sometimes struggle to find the motivation to keep going.

The Best Detail Is Written on the Plates

Mental health advertising can easily fall back on familiar motivational lines. GymNation takes a more tangible route by putting everyday worries where members can actually see them.

The choice of language is the strongest part of the idea. “The Future”, “Never Enough” and “My Inbox” describe different kinds of pressure, from larger uncertainties to small daily frustrations. Together, they make the installation feel connected to ordinary life rather than a generic message about wellbeing.

There is also a practical lesson here for outdoor creativity. A campaign does not always need a large structure, complicated technology or an entirely new format to attract attention. Sometimes, changing a familiar object is enough to make people look twice.

That approach has particular value in a gym, where the equipment already has a clear purpose. The creative idea does not have to explain why the audience should pay attention. It changes something people recognise and lets the message emerge from that change.

Adidas explored a related connection between fitness and mental wellbeing in its Training Series campaign, another example of how exercise can become the starting point for a broader conversation.

The Worry Bench has its limits, of course. An installation can prompt reflection and conversation, but the campaign details do not establish whether it changes members’ mental health or exercise habits. Its creative value lies in making an often invisible subject easier to acknowledge.

For Campaigns of the World, the Worry Bench demonstrates how closely an idea can be tied to its setting without becoming predictable. GymNation works with something its audience already understands, the weight on a barbell, and gives it another meaning.

The result is a campaign that makes people look at familiar equipment differently. The weights remain the same, but the words invite a different conversation about what people carry into the gym.