It’s hard to think of a better ad for glue than this Selleys effort

You may accuse Selley’s of being a bit too literal in their latest OOH stunt, but when did that ever hurt a brand?

As part of DuluxGroup’s campaign for glue brand Selleys, the creative team hit on a ‘sticky’ marketing idea (sorry), daring Australia to test the strength of Selleys Liquid Nails Extreme Grab by glueing a kayak, an arcade machine, and a 2.8-metre marlin to a billboard and inviting the public to take them. (Spoiler: no one could.)

The campaign is described as ‘a celebration of product confidence turned into a public spectacle. No tricks. No special effects. Just brute Aussie effort against a canister of glue. And the glue won.’

Agency Thinkerbell Australia helped come up with the idea, and we must say Selleys' ‘Aussies vs. Glue’ is something of a masterclass in unmissable brand participation.

The premise is delightfully simple: basically just glue some stuff to a billboard, then invite the public to try to pull it off. Given the product’s use case, it’s hard to argue with the message here.

The result? Crowds gathered, egos were challenged, and creator content ensued.

The stunt transforms a product demonstration into public theatre, a bit like what Red Bull do with a far larger budget.

Selley's stunt has been dubbed “playvertising”: a new term to us, but we’ll go with it, given that effort certainly involves a fair dollup of hands-on fun. It also works perfectly in person and online, and we’re reminded a tad of this effort from Dairy Boy, in which experiential was subverted into an online spectacle.

Hats off then to Selleys, then, for nailing the sweet spot between product literalism and cultural participation. 

In an age where outdoor work and social rarely become bedfellows successfully, this is something of a trailblazer.