Dutch tattooist Henk Schiffmacher – who decorated several body parts of Kurt Cobain and the Chili Peppers – is doing a joint promotion with the Belgium beer brand Palm. He tattooed a can of Palm and calls upon the crowd to do the same – possible with any sharp object. Photos of the beer cans are to be uploaded on a dedicated Facebook page and the winning can will be produced and displayed in every supermarket in the Netherlands. We wonder whether Palm is your typical tattoo lovers beer – especially when watching the two Belgium, tattoo-less characters trying to sell this promotion – but other than that, we think it’s a good example of how crowd sourcing can work – the task is not too simple, not too difficult, and the reward is attractive enough to be able to incentivize the campaign. Created by SSSS & Orchestra.

We’ve been seeing a lot lately from Stamenkovits Stibbe Stalenhoef Schreuder & Orchestra. Not your regular advertising though, but in the form of a self promotional print campaign in trade magazine Adformatie. We’re featuring it, because it doesn’t look like your typcial agency advertising. Most agencies that advertise in Adformatie not very originally create a collage with screenshots of their work and a header that reads more or less: “we kick ass”. Instead, in print SSSS & Orchestra created 6 spreads or so with a bit of long copy on the site. The spreads are about clients that don’t want to broadcast the director’s cut, which is to say that clients are part of the creative process at SSSS. On the most striking photo everyone is wearing pink. Although the copy in the image reads “pink is the new black” – to say that opportunities are everywhere – it feels somewhat desperate.

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O.k., guys – an we really mean ‘guys’ – since we had such a great, uncomplicated weekend, we’ll start with some advertising that is really easy to digest. And we’re not going to be smart about it. We’re not going to talk about double layers. Or make critical remarks about the key message or the brand positioning. No subtle notes about the execution. Nope. We’ll just give you some advertising that feels completely like advertising. Maybe not really our style, but this did kind of make our day. Created by SSSS & Orchestra.

For all the MadMen still working today, longing for Christmas, and needing some distraction badly; here you go! We aim to serve. There’s so much to say about these ads. And then again, there’s so much not to say about them, since they pretty much speak for them selves. One thing is sure, though; the terms ‘impact’, ‘free publicity’, and ‘word of mouth’ were probably used by SSSS & Orchestra when presenting their concept. And indeed, just like the Suit Supply campaign, this one might also be able to cause a bit of a stir. In fact, if Hunkemöller is lucky enough, some women might even feel compelled to submit a complaint at the Dutch Advertising Standards Authority. After all, most women don’t look this foxy in Hunkemöller’s underwear. So first of all the ads are misleading. But more importantly, presenting women obsessed by phalli is an oversimplification of the female mind – women are far more complex. How disrespectful! Or something… Anyway, Marcel van der Vlugt was the lucky photographer who shot this divine creature for magazines and outdoor, to be used in Holland, Belgium, Germany, and Spain. Merry Christmas!

The compact team of SSSS & Orchestra – a name that always makes us trip between the third and fourth ‘S’ – thanks its clients with a very sympathetic Christmas present this year; a CD (read: compact disc) in black tie with the agency’s favourite Christmas classics. Since we don’t own any Christmas compilations and – more importantly – always appreciate a gift, we’ve already played the album quite a few times, reminding ourselves that it is Christmas soon. We have to admit that every now and then we skip a song, since the different music styles are as diverse as the people on the album cover. As you can imagine Bela Stamenkovits (glasses, showing his watch) and Ed Stibbe (grey hair, tilted bow tie) have a more – let’s say – mature taste with Otis Redding and Chris Rea, while the pretty girls prefer Beyonce, Lady GaGa, and Destiny’s Child. In the CD booklet the S’s and their orchestra explain what kind of Christmas mood belongs to their favourite songs, which gives the album an extra personal touch. Thanks, 4xS&O for getting us in the Christmas mood!

Dutch Fashion brand G-Star appointed Nothing Amsterdam to run its international account. Joris Aperghis, CMO G-Star said Nothing understands the brand and the challenges that lay ahead to help it with its international growth.  G-Star was founded in 1989 (originally called Gap Star). Today the brand has over a 1000 employees and 250 shops in 69 countries. This is G-Star’s first agency, which is quite surprising given the fact that already for quite a while the brand has launched international ad campaigns – most recently with photographer Anton Corbijn.
Amsterdam Worldwide hired ‘Director of Strategy’ Uli Kurtenbach to support the agency with (among other brands) the brand new tequila account Olmeca and to help it develop new products and services – which sounds interesting and a bit vague at the same time. Kurtenbach lives in Amsterdam already for 14 years. He worked at Wieden+Kennedy Amsterdam (together with his new agency’s ECD, Richard Gorodecky), 2008 (today SSSS & Orchestra), and most recently at Naked, where he was managing partner.

The Nivea Sun app – created by Muse and app builder Ice Mobile – provides the consumer with up to date news about UV radiation. The app combines your GPS location, time of day and skin type, to tell you how long you can stay in the sun with a certain type of SPF. In fact, it will give you a notification when you have to get out of the sun. Though we would expect this kind of brand utility to be created specifically for the Australian market – where 1 out of every 3 persons is diagnosed with skin cancer at some point – it’s a pretty smart way to become the expert in ‘protection’. The only problem might be that it’s a little too innovative for Nivea Sun’s core ‘utility’ target – mother’s with young children? We also have to mention that it made us immediately think of SSSS&Orchestra’s Sun Radar – a brand utility that tells you which ‘Wieckse Witte’-serving terraces are sunny. But advertising is an incestueus industry anyway, so let us praise Nivea for not choosing the obvious road and understanding the added value of a brand utility.

Agency 2010 has become SSSS & Orchestra. 2010, that changed its name – not very conveniently – every year, was founded in 2008 by 6 founding fathers. After 2 partners had already left the agency, online guru Jeroen de Bakker recently left to found Lab1111. With only three of the founding partners left – Béla Stamenkovits, Ramon Stalenhoef en Mischa Schreuder – the agency attracted Ed Stibbe as managing director. Stibbe, who was managing Lowe until 2009, is the fourth S on board – hence the name. We don’t really know how to pronounce the new name properly (like s,s,s,s or like a snake), but wish them all the best!

Condomerie is an Amsterdam based condom shop that calls itself the first specialized condom shop in the world – ‘since 1987’. Apart from an offline shop – located pretty close to the world famous red light district – Condomerie also has an online shop. A good reason to create some international rumour around the brand. Agency 2010 came up with the idea to use the brand new medium Chatroulette to generate traffic to its shop. The topless lady literally conveyed the message: “BINGO. You are now in touch with a HIV infected person. Don’t play Russian roulette in real life”. A message that must have come accross loud and clear to all the ‘wankers’ on Chatroulette.

This is quite an innovative ad for Samsung. We’re a bit late showing it, since the Olympics are already over, but the mechanism of this ‘spectacular’ is quite impressive. The video basically speaks for itself; you can film and mail yourself directly from the interactive tram halt. The content is a bit lame, but we’ll forgive Samsung. At least we’re getting the message that de Samsung Omnia has an app that allows you to follow the Winter Olympics wherever you are – although we have to say that we could do the same with the offcial Vancouver App on our iPhone. Anyway, it was made by Media Republic and 2010 in collaboration with JC Decaux.