Barclaycard gets romantic in latest campaign

Lost love, heartache, a yearning for someone you’ve never properly met… we’ve all felt it before, and Barclaycard’s latest promotion for its Freedom Rewards card is looking to exploit such bittersweet feelings in a bid to build awareness for the new offer.

Devised by BBH, the two 30-second TV ads look to creatively pull on the public’s heart strings with their tongue-in-cheek message, and are being bolstered by digital and social media activity, as well as PR and advertorial inserts.

Released on the 14th of October, the short films describe the heartbreaking stories of narrators Simon and Chris, both shop attendants with secret crushes on beautiful women who make consistent purchases at their stores.

It all ends in tears for the young men, whose objects of affection end up abandoning their stores after taking advantage of the Barclaycard Freedom Rewards card, which lets them shop around whatever stores they like for the best price and still earn double points…. Are you sobbing in unison with us?

http://youtu.be/tNSjbvmvN5g

“We know that people like to shop around: nearly half the population shops at more than one supermarket to get the best deals. So it’s clear that the days of being loyal to one brand or one outlet are gone,” Katherine Whitton, marketing director, Barclaycard told The Drum.

“It’s all about convenience and added value. For that reason we wanted to create a credit card that facilitates this modern shopping behaviour. As counter intuitive as that sounds from a brand we decided that it is where the future of shopping is. And so we developed an ad campaign that brings this to life in a humorous and subversive way.”