Captain Risky versus Neil and Gaz: A tale of two insurance campaigns

Clients: Budget Direct and AAMI

Agency: 303Lowe for Budget Direct; Ogilvy Melbourne for AAMI

Market: Australia

Campaign scope:

Budget Direct: Cinema, TV, digital, social, print and outdoor advertising featuring 'Captain Risky', a "loveable daredevil character who designs his life around risk and can’t work out why Budget Direct won’t insure him."

AAMI: TV, digital, outdoor, online, social media and radio campaign in which the brand's recurring characters, Neil and Gaz, showcase the company's Safe Driver App and "Australia's Best Driver" contest (top prize A$100,000).   

Press release quote:

Budget Direct: Richard Morgan, ECD, 303Lowe: “Captain Risky is a larger than life, adrenaline-loving, front man for Budget Direct. Risk is his passion and his reason for being. He embodies all the high-risk activities that Budget Direct will not insure." 

AAMI: Brendon Guthrie, ECD, Ogilvy Melbourne: “People are naturally competitive and there’s an inherent self-satisfaction in beating others and earning bragging rights. Driving is no exception, but we needed to ensure it was demonstrated within the limits of safe driving. Enter Neil and Gaz, who tap into this competitive insight in a humorous way.”

Campaign Asia-Pacific comments:

Both campaigns have strong points: Cinematic scope and fairly impressive visual effects in the Brand Direct ad (303Lowe's first work for the account, which it won in August), lovably silly characters in the AAMI campaign. If forced to choose, we'd give the edge to AAMI because its campaign entices potential customers to take a specific action (downloading the app) with an attractive carrot (the prize money). That said, Budget Direct's argument—that it is already doing the work to keep rates low—is also compelling, and it would be interesting to assess the success of the divergent approaches later on.

CREDITS

Ogilvy Melbourne for AAMI

ECD: Brendon Guthrie
Senior Copywriter: Lenna Boland
Art Director: Jesse McCormack
Agency Producer: Lauren Free
Director: Matt Kamen
Production Company: Good Oil
Producer: Llew Griffiths
Group Account Director: Matt Rose
Account Director: Toby Gill
Account Manager: Rebecca Lawler

303Lowe for Budget Direct

ECD: Richard Morgan
Copywriter: Sean Larkin
Art Director: Adam Whitehead
Head of Business Management: Tony Dunseath
Business Director: Sophie O’Sullivan
Head of Strategy: Jon McKie
Agency Producer: Amanda Cain & Sean Ascroft
Director of Marketing & Digital: Jonathan Kerr
General Manager New Customer Acquisition: Paul Duggan
Campaign Manager: Jenni Osborne
Director: Hamish Rothwell
Production Company: GoodOil
Producer: Sam Long
D.O.P:  Crighton Bone
Editor: Mark Burnett
Effects: Alt VFX
Music/ Sound: Song Zu
Photographer: Mat Baker,
Stills Production: Louis & Co.