Fanta Takes ‘Less Serious’ Approach

Building on the success of Fanta’s most unified and largest global marketing campaign to date, “Less Serious,” which first launched in 2007, the soft drink brand has now set its sights on teens and moms worldwide in regions accounting for 90 percent of its global sales volume in 2011.

The latest version of Less Serious provides a flexible marketing platform that addresses needs of distinct markets while being fully integrated through a single core creative idea. Its U.S. debut was the March 30 broadcast of Fanta’s “Chase” commercial on “American Idol” on FOX.

Additional markets for the campaign has been implemented on a regional basis for several years in markets include Latin America, Europe, Africa and Asia.

“Moving to one consistent global marketing platform is a strategic and necessary progression for a brand with Fanta’s international footprint,” explained Joe Tripodi, EVP and chief marketing & commercial officer of the Coca-Cola Co. in Atlanta. “At the same time, we’ve developed a platform that is flexible enough to address specific business needs for the brand in different markets. This continued evolution with Fanta Less Serious demonstrates our commitment to marketing productivity.”

Less Serious is being rolled out with a flexible approach that enables each market to choose from three marketing focuses: communicating the product’s great taste, the brand’s less serious attitude, or the latest product news. Each of the marketing components retains the same overarching theme featuring bubbly animated characters as the catalyst to play more and adopt a less serious attitude to life. The strategy aims to deliver a consistent message on an international scale, while the flexible elements will aid in achieving and maintaining local relevance.

“One of the many great things about this campaign is that it appeals to the entire family,” noted Caren Pasquale Seckler, VP, flavor brands portfolio at Coca-Cola North America. “It has the flexibility to communicate the great taste of Fanta in a fun way and to convey the things about the brand that we know families already love -- 100 percent natural flavors, caffeine free and fruity fun. The characters featured in the new campaign encourage people to have more Fanta and be less serious. They represent the brand’s carefree attitude and cool-vibe persona that appeals perfectly to teens.”

The campaign continues to employ rich visuals and animation that approach the level of artistic detail found in sophisticated animated films, and showcases characters with unique personalities to enable teens to relate to them on a personal level, according to Coca-Cola.

Created in collaboration withglobal  creative agency Ogilvy & Mather and Psyop, an animation shop with offices in New York and Los Angeles and the creator of Coca-Cola’s Happiness Factory, Less Serious makes use of global research conducted to define the most effective way to universally reach teens. Traditional and nontraditional marketing components of the campaign include broadcast commercials, print and out-of-home advertisements, mobile ringtones, websites, digital banners, and in-store displays. More than 100 markets will use the same website design, which can be viewed at www.Fanta.com.