2017 Winners & Shortlists

The Campaign

Rooted in this unspoken truth, our idea flourished when Coca-Cola decided to highlight a worrying observation. How were Egyptians wearing other countries’ jerseys and not their own? As silly as it seemed, as indicative as it was to so much more. Egyptians not wearing their national jerseys was a sign of apathy and disloyalty. We needed to wake Egyptians up. It was time to start wearing our jerseys again. Our message was simple, if you’re really Egyptian, you won’t wear another jersey, give us any other jersey you have, and we’ll replace it with an Egyptian one. Be it authentic or fake, any jersey could be replaced with Coca-Cola.

Creative Execution

Our campaign began with a docu-drama launched on social media that called for change. Highlighting our key insight and calling Egyptians out with the message, “If you’re really an Egyptian, you won’t wear another jersey!” Complimenting the online launch, our idea traveled in store as well, as we produced limited edition bottles with double sleeves. The bottles were designed to appear wearing foreign jerseys, and to open the bottle, one needed to peel off the jersey, revealing the Egyptian jersey with our message. 10 thousand bottles were released in stores and in cafes that aired the matches, hitting our target right in the heat of the moment, and pushing them to exchange their foreign jerseys for the Egyptian one.

Indication of how successful the outcome was in the market

All 10,000 limited edition bottles were sold, while the campaign successfully distributed over 50,000 Coca-Cola Egypt jerseys. Online, the campaign reached 40 million users and was shared by over 20 different online publications for free. Influencers, celebrities and opinion leaders all over the country shared the campaign and participated by using our hashtag to show off their own new Coke jerseys that they had exchanged in support of the initiative. Prime time TV shows featured our campaign and interviewed Coke’s Brand Manager live to help promote the initiative, achieving over $50,000 in earned media.

With competition being the main sponsor of the event and most of its star players, Coca-Cola needed to work on what it owned, The Egyptian Fan. For Coca Cola, the brand that supported the Egyptian football fan for the last decade, this state of apathy was a crisis! Coke felt it had a responsibility towards its consumers. And with all brands across the country communicating the event, we decided to stray away from the field, from the game and get closer to the emotion and the stifled pride in Egyptians. Our campaign wasn’t about football, it was about being proudly Egyptian.