Omaze x Run The Jewels x ACLU - Win A 1987 Buick GNX
I was not the initial creative director on this campaign, but I did eventually take it over (with the creative director’s blessing).
Omaze partnered with Run The Jewels on a campaign benefitting the ACLU. Part of the campaign was that Run The Jewels was going to give away a 1987 Buick Grand National GNX, so one of the campaign objectives was how to educate the larger audience on the origin, prestige, and legend of what essentially looks like a 1980s boxy Buick, but more on that later. First things first…
Run The Jewels had, at the time, a growing and fervent fanbase. Killer Mike and El-P are your favorite rappers’ favorite rappers, and the two started seeing more and more mainstream success after multiple avant-garde comedic appearances on Adult Swim.
There was no one better to pitch winning the ultimate “if you know, you know” car than the ultimate “if you know, you know” band.
Run The Jewels’ comedic sensibilities are out there. Run The Jewels are very funny. And because of that, we could throw some crazy, out there ideas at them for the campaign’s anchor video, and boy did I…
Run The Jewels loved the ideas and the direction. They picked the “Don’t Touch That Dial” and “Used Car Salesmen” concepts, and we were off to the races.
I wrote the bonkers scripts:
The shoot would be in Chicago during their tour. Soundstages were secured, crews were assembled, and storyboards were made:
And then, the DAY before the shoot:
Someone on their tour came down with COVID and everything was shut down. What was going to be a full-scale production shoot turned into possibly getting an iPhone video of Run The Jewels backstage.
I, in Los Angeles, quickly (in something like under an hour) wrote and sent an updated, iPhone-shoot ready script to the production team in Chicago for the new video:
The shoot ended up just being Run The Jewels and their tour manager in a room. The tour manager shot footage with one iPhone and had our director and producer on another iPhone trying to give direction, but because our director and producer weren’t in the room, they could not see or hear anything that was going on.
None of this was Run The Jewels’ fault (They are amazing!) but here are some “highlights” of the footage we got back:
The first time Run The Jewels realize there is a script for the video is captured In. The. Footage.
At one point, El-P does not realize that Killer Mike is “in character” when he says “Can we stop? I don’t feel comfortable doing this” and thinks he legitimately wants to leave.
They were doing a lot of ad-libbing and improv (because A. At this point they didn’t know there was a script. B. They had to do something because they couldn’t hear anything from our director and producer and vice versa. and C. They are legitimately super cool) and eventually, El-P gives up and says, “We have to end somewhere here with us giving a car away,” and then just gives a thumbs-up and stops talking. It is up there with CASABLANCA as one of the greatest endings ever.
We got the footage back and were told that it was all basically unusable and everyone was ready to just give up on the video and campaign altogether…
…everyone except ME.
It starts with an idea…
One of the great things about working with Run The Jewels is that Killer Mike and El-P are creative and funny, so even when a bunch of footage has nothing, there’s still something. I kept on looking at the footage and started to piece something together.
I sent this email to two of our in-house editors:
We got to work on creating the video. Our editors delivered cuts, I gave notes:
I pulled in one of our graphic designers to create an Omaze-branded “Please Stand By” card, add some color bars to drop between “re-takes” and make a humorous animation over the regular Omaze endcard to really hit home that this video was the intent all along (even though I found this video COMPLETELY IN THE EDIT.)
And what started as 10 minutes of unusable footage TURNED INTO THIS!
Blooper video looks like an intentional concept from the beginning and that RTJ are totally bought-in and excited to be a part of it.
On-brand for Omaze AND for RTJ. The “Please Stand By” and “Not Killer Mike’s” end card bolster the “intentional from the start” and voice synergy sentiments.
RTJ come off great! Super charismatic and entertaining (because they are). Their entire performance was literally manufactured and pieced together IN THE EDIT.
Now that we have a video that is CRUSHING IT on social, CTV, paid, and organic channels, I combined that with copy for landing pages, emails, and static socials that leans into the street-cred, the crazy story behind its creation, its incredibly limited-edition run, and if-you-know-you-know status of THE muscle car that is coveted by celebrities, athletes, rock stars, and cultural tastemakers. All with old-school, baller ‘80s vibes.
I took a campaign that people were ready to abandon and turned it into one of Omaze’s most successful campaigns of the year.
