Last week I caught myself watching a commercial several times at the Shanghai subway. It first caught my eye because it was really very professionally done, different from the often clumsy Chinese products, where the price seemed to have been the main issue of the client.
Not this one. It took a while before I discovered it was a Starbucks commercial, very nicely woven into a bigger story of a country girl making career in Shanghai, becoming a blogger and a latte drinker, exploring her love life.
It touches very subtle on the fast-changing urban society and the aspirations of young Chinese.
James Areddy of the Wall Street Journal had already written about the commercial "A Sunny Day", I discovered.
"It's quite unique and demonstrates a departure from conventional marketing," says Howard Schultz, Starbucks chairman. The coffee company hasn't traditionally advertised, Mr. Schultz says, adding that a soap opera can be effective since it creates "real entertainment for our customers and along the way there is a complementary message." PepsiCo, which will bottle and distribute the Starbucks-branded drinks, referred questions to Starbucks.
I could not find the commercial online yet, but I did find some other interesting movies made by Starbucks at Tudou. They are not as well done as the one I saw at the Shanghai subway, but illustrates a nice tendency of improved quality of the ads and - last but not least - a way to find their way online.
I'm curious to see how the Chinese internet reacts on this commercial use of this tool.
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