Muscle Milk(R) Builds Popularity With Television Debut, Online Videos

SAN FRANCISCO, April 1 /PRNewswire/ -- Muscle Milk® is furthering its "Drink. Evolve." effort with advertising agency of record Pereira & O'Dell. The premier protein-enhanced beverage is looking to attract market share by communicating to a younger demographic during the month of March. The brand's first-ever national television advertising campaign debuted one week before March Madness while an online video campaign rallies spring break vacationers.

(Photo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20100401/SF80492)

"We want to maintain credibility with athletes while also speaking to mainstream consumers such as health conscious college students and March is an ideal time to do this. But mostly we are having a lot of fun with these campaigns and taking the Muscle Milk brand to the next level," said Nikki Brown, Chief Marketing Officer at CytoSport.

The TV debut campaign titled "Just Look Good" first aired on March 8 and is comprised of three 15-second vignettes featuring Dave, Chet and Katie who, just by looking good, can get away with a lot.  Each character has discovered the power of incorporating protein into their diet by drinking Muscle Milk after a workout. The campaign runs through April 7 on ESPN, ESPN2, Dish and DirecTV networks. View the spots online at: www.youtube.com/CytoSportInc

"We've had a great deal of success with online video for Muscle Milk and didn't want to rule out consumption of traditional media and its impact on brand awareness," said Joshua Brandau, media director at Pereira & O'Dell.

Simultaneously, Muscle Milk launched "Spring Break It Down", www.springbreakitdown.com, a humorous online music video that rolls up the best spring break cliches in under two minutes. Set in an unidentified beach town, the two main characters rap about their ridiculously good looks and dance moves while enduring spring break-ups, falling asleep in the sun and airbrushed portraits on t-shirts. The video reached 1MM views during the week of Spring Break and continues to climb.

"Part of our overall mission in working with CytoSport is to introduce Muscle Milk to a mass audience, so we have created campaigns that capture their attention and relate to them through popular culture, " said Lauren Godfrey, Associate Creative Director at Pereira & O'Dell. People who aren't familiar with the idea of a protein nutrition shake might find it intimidating or think that it's not for them, but by using humor and the idea of ' Drink. Evolve.' we are letting them know that protein has benefits for everyone."

Pereira & O'Dell was named agency of record for Muscle Milk in May 2009 and recently won the media planning duties in January of this year based on their success using viral video and augmented reality to market the brand.

About Pereira & O'Dell

San Francisco-based Pereira & O'Dell is an advertising agency heavily influenced by the digital culture and focused on creating cross-disciplinary campaigns for progressive marketers. Since Pereira & O'Dell launched in March 2008, the agency has amassed a diverse client roster including Corona, Muscle Milk, popchips, University of Phoenix and LEGO, for whom they won two Gold pencils at the 2009 One Show Awards. Pereira & O'Dell, was named Advertising Age's 2009 Small Agency of the Year, Western Region, based on the company's business performance, impact on clients' businesses as well as industry leadership and innovation. For more information visit the website at: www.pereiraodell.com 

SOURCE Pereira & O'Dell