Special’s winning streak: Behind the Grand AXIS and a golden haul

Local advertising agency Special, turned heads at this year’s AXIS Awards, receiving recognition for its cleverly executed campaigns with cut through. StopPress met up with some of the team behind the winning work to find out how these creative masterpieces came to be. 

The agency’s outstanding campaign, ‘Last Performance’ for Partners Life, was recognised as the best work of the year, earning them not only the Grand AXIS but also two Gold AXIS, two Grand Prix, and the coveted Innovation AXIS.

In addition, Special was also honoured with two more Gold awards, one of which was another Grand Prix, for ‘Te Kākahu Hou’ for Education New Zealand and ‘Summer Never Sleeps’ with Kathmandu.

Scoundrel, the video production company behind ‘Summer Never Sleeps’ also picked up four Golds for their work with Kathmandu.

Despite being remarkably different subject matters, the campaigns that received the most attention on the night, Kathmandu’s ‘Summer Never Sleeps’, and Partners Life’s ‘Last Performance’ shared some similarities during the production phase.

“We found with both of them that good things take time,” says Lisa Fedyszyn, Executive Creative Director at Special Group New Zealand.

“Neither of them were fast turnaround at all. And in fact, ‘Last Performance’ took over two years.”

She says despite the idea for the campaign being relatively simple, its success was determined by whether Special could find the right production partner.

Both campaigns also had very cooperative clients at the centre of them she adds. “With Kathmandu and Partner’s Life, both clients are creative, ambitious and innovative and they work with us to create the best creative product possible. You absolutely cannot make that kind of work without great clients.”

For ‘Last Performance’ the collaboration with Brokenwood Mysteries was the perfect match and one Special was careful to approach with respect for the creator’s vision.

This was done by pitching to South Pacific Pictures and working with the company to ensure the ad campaign didn’t “bastardise their show in anyway”, Jonathan McMahon, Executive Creative Director at Special NZ says.

A large part of the ads’ success came down to Partners Life acknowledging its role as a life insurance provider by embracing death and being willing to push themselves, he adds.

Rory Gallery, Special’s Chief Strategic Officer, says this campaign also had a clever approach to its media strategy.

“Quite often when people are trying to communicate about life insurance, they’re interrupting the programming of what other people are watching which might be a much easier, happier thing than people were watching in this case.”

Since this audience was already engaging with death by watching a murder-mystery television show, these ads were not interrupting them in the same way that other ads might be.

“We engaged people when they were actively thinking about death. I think that’s why it landed as well as it did,” Gallery adds.

As for why these three campaigns drew particular attention from the Axis judges, the team put it down to them all having an element of the unexpected in them.

“They all resonate quite strongly because of their simplicity, but also they’re all actually incredibly fresh and surprising at the same time.”

The team says having their work recognised at the Axis Awards was a proud moment for them as it’s hard to know how campaigns will be received when working on them.

“We felt so much pride, and not just for the creative team, but everyone in the agency,” Fedsyzyn says.

“It’s not just about the projects that were recognised… Everyone worked so hard on all the projects for all our wonderful clients. It’s the thing that keeps us buzzing every day, getting around every project, not just a select few. It felt wonderful to celebrate with everyone.”

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