Creative Corner: Brewdog's ad ban, Crisis's homelessness nobody can ignore and how to relieve World Cup nerves

BrewDog’s five a day ban

Barely a week goes by without BrewDog commanding our attention somehow, and this time it’s the dusting off of a classic PR tactic - getting your advert banned to increase exposure.

The beer company’s ‘five a day’ campaign - around fruity limited production brews Lost in Guava, Pineapple Punch and Lost In Lychee & Lime - was rapped by the ASA and as sure as death and taxes, was therefore covered extensively by just about every outlet going.

There was even a suggestion from one journalism lecturer - later clarified as merely speculation - that the complaint to the ASA may have originated from within BrewDog towers itself.

Thoughts on that?

Crisis that can’t be ignored

Homelessness is an issue for thousands all year round, but it’s brought especially to the fore as Christmas looms and the colder weather bites. We all know it’s there, we’d all like to think we can do something to help - but how many of us actually do?

Charity Crisis have pulled out a real stop-you-in-your-tracks campaign this year, unveiling a giant, and very lifelike, sculpture of a homeless person called Alex. Its plea is for homelessness to stop being ignored and this makes it almost impossible to do so.

World Cup nerves handled

How to leverage the World Cup for your client…? It’s the conundrum taking up a LOT of time at many a creative agency at the moment, but props to PropellerNet (see what I did there?), for finding a great link between that sick-in-the-stomach feeling you can only get from watching England at a major tournament and spa treatments.

Its research around football-induced nerves and how to soothe them led to some great coverage for SpaSeekers.com - we particularly love the themed treatments fans can try like ‘tiki taka temple rubs’ and the ‘4-claw-2’.