Client: SunAmerica (Los Angeles)
Client: SunAmerica (Los Angeles)
PR Team: Bragman Nyman & Cafarelli (Los Angeles)
Campaign: Child Stars Teach Boomers to Save
Time Frame: Mid-July through September 1999
Budget: dollars 50,000 to dollars 100,000
Financial services isn’t a sexy category. How do you dress up non-visual
retirement products, especially when they’re targeted to boomers in
denial about their savings situation?
A big challenge for anyone. But it is especially difficult for
SunAmerica, a wholly owned subsidiary of American International Group,
which specializes in retirement programs and doesn’t boast the name
recognition of Fidelity or Prudential.
Yet ad agency Deutsch came up with a campaign that - with its light
approach - turned the category on its ear. The ads, which aired in June
and generated much talk, appealed to baby boomers’ love of luxurious
cars, watches and diamonds (SunAmerica found that 61% of men and 53% of
women in that generation say they have little or no retirement savings).
The fantasy was jarringly juxtaposed with the reality of what those
goodies will do to your retirement kitty - that dollars 6,500 watch is
really worth dollars 30,296, assuming pre-tax annual growth at 8% over
20 years.
The challenge: how to continue the buzz with an equally exciting
publicity effort?
Strategy
’Our goal was to get our brand into consumer media,’ says Don Spetner,
SunAmerica’s VP for corporate communications. ’It’s hard to get a
non-sexy, complicated product on television.’ Spetner came up with the
idea of using former child stars who had squandered their fortunes -
boomers are nostalgic and the nation is celebrity-crazed. The ex-stars
would get media attention and boomers might listen to their advice about
saving.
The company came up with three former kid stars: Brandon Cruz, Eddie on
the Courtship of Eddie’s Father; Jon Provost, Timmy on Lassie; and Paul
Petersen who starred as Jeff on The Donna Reed Show. Petersen and his
wife had gone on to create A Minor Consideration, a nonprofit advocacy
group for child stars. ’We were looking for people who were
irresponsible then, but presentable now,’ Spetner explains.
Tactics
To kick things off, SunAmerica’s PR agency, Bragman Nyman Cafarelli, put
on a splashy party/press conference at the Museum of Television & Radio
in Beverly Hills on July 19. Members of the press interviewed the three
stars and Eli Broad, chairman and CEO of SunAmerica. Other former child
stars like Morgan Brittany of Dallas and Stan Livingston of My Three
Sons were also there. SunAmerica presented Petersen’s organization with
a dollars 10,000 donation. The follow-up act was a barrage of interviews
by Petersen on CNNfn and shows like Good Day New York on the Fox
network.
In addition, there was a press kit that included statistics on America’s
paltry savings rate, a brochure with saving tips and a promotional watch
- a tie-in to the watch ad.
Results
Timing is everything. Two things worked against the campaign. Thirty
members of the press were invited to the party, but the event came two
days after John F. Kennedy Jr.’s disappearance. The timing was also off
in that most talk shows were on hiatus. ’We got about one-fifth of what
we expected,’ says Michael Nyman, president of Nyman Bragman
Cafarelli.
But Spetner insists the campaign exceeded objectives. What surprised
him, he says, was the coverage on the business pages of newspapers like
the Los Angeles Times and the trades Investment News and Institutional
Investor. ’I took it as a sign of success that we got in the tabloid the
Globe,’ he adds. Another point of pride came at a cocktail party
honoring the company’s chairman. ’The mayor of Los Angeles comes up to
me, and when I introduced myself, he asked me if I was the one who did
that child star thing,’ he says. ’He said it was one of the greatest
campaigns he’d seen.’
Future
Who’s next at bat? Spetner is talking with former major league baseball
players to do a campaign similar to the child stars effort.
