When it comes to money, South Africans are notoriously overextended, with one of the lowest savings and highest debt-to-income ratios in the world, says Nedbank. 

The anti-advertising campaign was created through a series of fictitious product commercials. However, instead of selling products, the campaign aims to strike the conscience of South Africans around the critical need to '#TakeMoneySeriously' by joining the bank that already does.

"We, together with Nedbank, found that this is a golden opportunity for us to draw attention to the reality of overspending and irresponsible borrowing, as well as the urgent need to save and invest for the long term," says Xolisa Dyeshana, chief creative officer at Joe Public United.

"Therefore, we had to ask ourselves how we awaken a social conscience of 'investorism' rather than consumerism. The result is a thought-provoking campaign that takes the very same advertising messages that usually encourage spending and, instead, use them to stimulate critical thinking and challenge underlying presuppositions around banking and money," adds Dyeshana.

Directed by Greg Gray from Romance Films, each of the five films in the campaign appears, at first glance, to be a commercial we are all familiar with. However, as each film progresses, the allusions to unchecked spending gradually become more pronounced to reveal that 'all that glitters is not necessarily gold'.

Explicit references to banking clichés are intentionally held back to build interest, intrigue and impact before revealing that this is, in fact, a commercial for a bank.

Romance Films was challenged to create a sense of the unexpected within each trope to break through viewer complacency with conventional executions. Working in collaboration with Joe Public United, the thinking and filmic treatment was pushed to arrive at something distinctive and evocative.

The campaign features products in the most desirable and aspirational (but also the most financially perilous) way possible.

The fully integrated 360-degree, through-the-line campaign will continue to roll out across all mass media platforms, digital media, outdoor advertising and PR.



For more information, visit www.joepublic.co.za. You can also follow Joe Public United on Facebook, Twitter or on Instagram.