100 Years Skincare for Life: NIVEA Makes Billion-Euro Investment in Its Biggest Global Campaign Ever

HAMBURG, Germany, May 16, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- NIVEA, the largest skincare brand in the world, along with its business partner, global marketing communications agency Draftfcb, is rolling out a new global campaign, "100 Years Skincare for Life" beginning the week of May 15.

"This is a significant time for NIVEA. The '100 Years Skincare for Life' campaign will facilitate sustained and profitable growth for the NIVEA brand on the basis of its core competencies," explained Markus Pinger, Beiersdorf Board Member, responsible for brands. "When we named Draftfcb our global lead agency of record in November, we collectively created a new agency model with the goal of becoming faster and more innovative and to spur aggressive global growth. Draftfcb is much more involved in developing processes and strategies than previously, supplying us with insights early on and championing the NIVEA brand throughout our customers' lives."

Led by Draftfcb along with other partner agencies, the campaign is NIVEA's biggest and most integrated initiative to date, with TV, social media, retail activation, print, and digital among the various channels being used.

The plan is to transport the iconic brand in a new direction built upon the idea: "Better skincare makes life feel better."

"We know that people only feel comfortable in their skin if they are happy about the way they look. According to a study*, that is currently only around 10 percent of all women worldwide. This knowledge was one of the main factors in our decision to make skin the focus of our campaign," added Pinger.

NIVEA has signed up international singing star Rihanna to be the voice of its 100 year celebrations, and the song 'California King Bed' will accompany the whole anniversary campaign internationally.

The global campaign is centered around the values that have been associated with NIVEA for generations: trust, honesty, reliability, quality and family. Compelling visuals have been selected to elevate the importance of skin. Each captures moments of closeness between people of different ages, genders and nationalities.

"NIVEA has a long and powerful history.  While recognizing this, we also wanted to show its modern side and move it in a new direction by reclaiming the emotional connection of the skincare business," said Draftfcb London President Kate Howe. "We've renewed the sense of the brand and positioned skincare and NIVEA's core values centre-stage with this new campaign."

"Our strategic approach to developing the campaign was simple: to 'reclaim skincare'," said Draftfcb Vice Chairman and Global Chief Creative Officer Jonathan Harries. "The creative team who led the campaign included Luis Dias, Draftfcb Lisbon president, Mark Fiddes, executive creative director of the London agency, and Dagan Cohen, executive creative director in Amsterdam.  Their roles were key in developing the new campaign and successfully capturing moments of powerful emotion and beautiful skin."

The campaign will first break on television and print in Australia, Austria, Italy, New Zealand, Poland and Switzerland and will roll out in other countries over the next weeks and months. Other campaigns featuring the key body care product lines -- Visage, Body and Deo -- will follow.

As part of the expanded Beiersdorf/Draftfcb partnership, a stewardship model has been implemented, which means Draftfcb has the lead role and responsibility for brand management on a global basis even if a specialist agency is brought on board for certain tasks. While Draftfcb has tapped into its global network spanning 99 countries to identify consumer insights from around the world on Beiersdorf's behalf, it has identified four agencies as the creative and strategic 'hotspots' for NIVEA: Hamburg, London, Paris and New York.  Draftfcb Chicago is taking the lead on all shopper marketing activities.

Please find further texts, photos, footage, and videos on NIVEA's 100th anniversary in the Virtual NIVEA Press Room at http://www.Beiersdorf.com/NIVEA100

* Source : Noxema on http://www.totalbeauty.com/editors_blogs/shocking-new-skin-care-survey-it-amazed-me-anyway

SOURCE Draftfcb