Slim Fast Drink

No guessing today. Just one of those surprising, yet oddly familiar ideas that leave me undecided between "Damn, that's cool!" and "Damn, why did I not think of that one?!" Or is it just my love of yummy water in clever bottles?



"Drink yourself slim with Bad Liebenzeller mineral water"

Apparently the media budget of Bad Liebenzeller mineral water was rather tight, so why not use what is already and inevitably around the water when you buy it. I am sure this idea will have a positive and very literal word-of-mouth effect for them.

The clever message in a bottle has been released by German creative agency Grabbarz & Partner (if you are into slightly trashy, geeky, witty webstuff - and as a yaybia reader I am sure you are - make sure to only check their website if you don't have anything important to do in the next couple of minutes. Or hours, for that matter).

VitaminWater + NCAA

Sports, Ahh, Sports! March Madness has occupied my conscious hours this weekend, which actually hasn’t been that many due to pain killer induced naps. Anyways, most of you know Yaybia's love for VitaminWater so I was excited to see what they were going to bring to the court after the NCAA allowed them to play. Here’s what they rocked.


Consistency. VW has 20+ flavors but decided to place Revive as the face of the NCAA promotions. We might be confused as to why our brackets were busted the first day, but we’ll never be confused about the purple and white VW cups behind the benches.

Direction. Commercials end by showing the facebook.com/vitaminwater URL which drops you into the videos section of the profile. This eliminates steps in the sharing process and makes it easier for me to learn more about the brand, products and promotions without dealing with their crappy Flash site.


Partnership. Uploading your recreated game winning moment at ncaa.com/revive could win you a trip to the Final Four. Sweet deal. Nice branded URL and nice to have it on the NCAA site for a little credibility boost.

Any other thoughts? Too much VitaminWater? Not enough G?

Ypulse Year in Review Sneak Peek!

I'm working on a Ypulse feature of the best and worst teen-targeted campaigns of 2008, and I thought you Yaybies might appreciate a sneak peek. I'm still debating a few of the final spots, so please leave your suggestions in the comments!

BEST:

Obvs. Everything from Barack Obama's iconic logo to his sans serif font resonated with young voters, and Obama urged them to talk about it. The campaign mobilized youth by linking them together through forums they already used--Facebook, texting, Twitter, iPhone apps--and helped them form communities through which they rallied for change. Obama's team attitude and liberal policies clearly didn't hurt his popularity among youth, either. 18-29-year-old voters responded by voting for Obama in record numbers, and some think his focus on young voters won him the White House.

BEST:

Erin Yaybia'd this Dentyne campaign back in October and talked about how it is relevant to the way young people live their lives through a screen. We do want to disconnect, though, and I love that Dentyne wants to prepare me to make face time for my friends IRL. Sometimes "xoxo" just doesn't cut it.

BEST:

VitaminWater made two key partnerships this year with Gossip Girl and the Sex and the City movie. Their brand ambassadors have also made the beverage a must-have on college campuses. You might have guessed that we don't really mind the brand, either...

BEST:

I Yaybia'd this fall about how great this Target spot is. It taps into a real consumer insight about freshmen's roommate fears and puts a positive, exciting spin on them.

WORST:

I know teens aren't Toyota's target (besides the Scion, targeted at men 18-24) but sports fans of any age are ready to stab out their eardrums the next time they hear this commercial during every NCAA football commercial break. STOP.

WORST:

JC Penney has been missing the mark with all their teen-targeted back-to-school, but this one is especially off. I'm too young for The Breakfast Club, and I left high school over 4 years ago. It shows that JC Penney is exactly what they're fighting not to be--your mom's store.

WORST:

I pretty thoroughly bashed the Candie's Foundation PSA in an earlier Ypulse entry, but I just need to repeat that it's so parental and out of touch. Ugh.

I've got room for one more Best and two more Worst. What do you think? Save the Walls? Axe/Dove/both? That JohnMcCain MyBarackBook site? American Apparel? Toyota Scion? Let's hear 'em!

Vitamin Water called, they want their brand back.

If you are an old reader, you'd remember that all of us ladies here at Yaybia LOVE vitamin water. So I'm flipping through Allure Magazine last week, and I find this ad:


Woah brand extension? Vitamin Water making shampoo? Cool, does that mean my hair can smell like DragonFruit??? Double check - no mention of Vitamin Water, just vitaminshampoo. So I check out the website: www.vitaminshampoo.com, and look what I find:


Completely different packaging!! Fail? I think so. Check the "in the press link!" What do we find there? Examples of their magazine ads. And what do they look like?

Well, that is the issue I was in, and that certainly isn't the ad that I found. So what happened? I can't find any news in quickly poking around online, but it appears that someone copied the Vitamin Water design, it got printed, someone from Vitamin Water freaked out, and the packaging got redesigned.

Leave a comment if you know anything!

Very very interesting...

VitaminWater + Sex and the City: Final Installment

We brought you several VitaminWater/SATC promo posts over the past few months, and now we've finally seen the movie and experienced the theater madness (although our pre-movie cosmos made the chaos a bit easier to handle!) during opening weekend. To our delight, the theater was filled with VitaminWater gear and the partnership ended with a bang, well several.



The promo and partnership remained consistent and equal value was definitely exchanged. The SATC ladies and VW flavors made their final appearance together on posters, popcorn bags, and soda cups. The "a little help from your friends" tag line was promoted and couldn't have been a better fit as girls, and some guys, grabbed their friends and their heels and hit the theaters together. I'm going to miss this partnership just as I'll miss Carrie's single adventures.

VitaminWater didn't just stop with SATC though. At another movie outing this past weekend (apparently that's the thing to do this summer and brands are on to it) VitaminWater was spotted everywhere. Libby and I even tried to buy the "try it" button of the innocent 16 year old ticket taker. They've done a great job of dominating the space but not offending people. VitaminWater is still up against some tough beverage competition, but their marketing just might be strong enough to be the bevery of choice for many brand conscious consumers, and those that follow.

Not your average beverage

You have drunk Vitamin Water, you have listened to Powerthirst, you have seen Cucumber Pepsi, now check out this new "high efficiency survival beverage". I propose a celebrity partnership with Meat Loaf to further promote this potent potation.

If you think salad is for sissis, you just gonna love Meatwater. If you think vegetarians eat your food's food, you probably gonna chug-a-lug Beef Jerky in a bottle. If your dinner always involves pieces of a dead animal, you gonna want to down a liquid Schnitzel. If you love poultry, but think eggbeaters are mad roosters, you have finally found the solution for your daily dosis of meat without the annoying cooking part. You can even mix some fine wine into the new escargout flavour and serve it to your date for extra points on the sophistication scale. Now your infants can enjoy a real meal even before they are teething and meals-on-wheels just got a lot more efficient, too.

Juiciness has reached a whole new level.

VitaminWater + Sex and the City: The <3 Continues

Over here at Yaybia, we SEO with the best of them. Googling phrases we've blogged about to see where we show up in the rankings is pretty much a daily occurrence. So imagine my surprise when I typed in "vitamin water sex and the city" this afternoon and saw not just Yaybia (#6, woohoo!) but a new sponsored microsite from VitaminWater's domain.

I was initially ecstatic as the classic blank and magenta loaded and I was greeted with the four familiar faces I've been missing since 2004. But once I started clicking around, disappointment set in. The all-Flash site offers a chance to enter to win tickets to the Sex and the City movie premiere in New York. A "friends with benefits" section is currently listed as Coming Soon. Other links took me to wallpaper and movie photo galleries, the trailer, the VitaminWater MySpace page, and the official SATC movie site. Yawn! Where's the exclusive content? Where's the "forward to a friend" advergame? What's the sense in going live with this site if the presumably most important section, "friends with benefits," isn't even up yet?

Maybe VitaminWater realized that anyone who Googled that particular search string was getting directed to the comments of just a few smart bloggers and thought they'd better start directing that traffic to themselves. We'll stay tuned.

VitaminWater - Sex and the City : The Re-Domination

Our girls are back! The lovely ladies of Sex and the City have teamed up with VitaminWater to Rescue parched fans before the debut of their first full-length film. We mentioned earlier that the XXX label was graced with the presence of clever NYC inspired copy and now we're here to examine the latest VitaminWater partnership and SATC movie promotion.

I was purchasing my weekly 10 for $10 VitaminWater supply when I noticed the same skyline graphic on the Rescue label that appears on the XXX bottles. The only change is the lack of sparkling stars...I guess this is the daytime edition. The missing stars doesn't mean the copy doesn't shine. Check it:

is it just us, or does life never cease to amaze you? your best friend was dumped via text message, your sister wants you to wear a lime-green bridesmaid dress (with taffeta ruffles, of course), and your paparazzi friend posted all those scandalous pictures online…looks like you need to be rescued. well, this bottle is packed with vitamin c and egcg to help keep you from stumbling down the runway of life. and with our girls carrie, samantha, charlotte, and miranda making their debut on the big screen, we thought this might help with some of their “big” problems (because brunch time discussions don’t always cut it). so drink up and don’t worry about the photos…they were pictures of your “twin sister,” right?

VitaminWater has never done a label takeover partnership before Sex and the City, let alone done one twice. Is this going to be a successful continuation of the brilliant co-branding and marketing partnership? Will this diminish the value of the first promotion? Will anyone notice? Or do we just drink too much VitaminWater?

Vitamins + Marketing = All You Need: Vitamin Water and Sex and the City

VitaminWater has exploded into the lives of thirsty trend setters nationwide, its success fueled largely by the clever label copy. Each of the 12 flavors has its own quirky story related to the concoction of vitamins and deliciousness packed into each bottle. Kelly Clarkson and Fifty have already their own exclusive flavors. Do we taste fantastic branding and cross promotions? I think we do. Since its introduction in 2004, VitaminWater has only pursued partnerships with personalities...but out of nowhere, the label of our favored XXX and its powerful antioxidants has transformed into a co-branding effort to promote the Sex and the City movie hitting theaters this May. Check it:

just like our girl carrie would wonder...are healthy relationships and healthy diets really that different? sometimes you can't help but fall for the bad boy or at least agree to sample the dessert tray, but does either ever have a healthy outcome? is it possible to have both - the excitement of the naughty with the benefits of the nice? well, we'll leave the relationship advice to carrie, samantha, charlotte and miranda, but we can help with some insight into healthy lifestyles. and with the ladies of sex and the city back looking for the next "big" thing, we thought we'd add even a little more xxx to the silver screen - as in triple antioxidants from acai, blueberries, and pomegranate. so think of them as a love triangle without all the drama.

All VitaminWater's current marketing and partnerships target image-concerned teens and young adults, so their consumer base is exactly who SATC wants to reach. And what better way to flaunt your movie's sure-to-be clever, quotable dialogue than with a sneak preview in this witty copy? So thanks, Glaceau, for intelligent partnerships and long copy that makes us smile. Some might call it selling out; we call it smart integration into all aspects of a consumer's life.