Title	FOOTBALL OR FATHER
Brand	LOVE CONDOM - REMED PHARMA
Product/Service	CONDOMS
Category	A01. Fiction: series or film
Entrant Company	BBDO BELGIUM Brussels, BELGIUM
Contributing Company	BBDO BELGIUM Brussels, BELGIUM
Production Company	WITLOOF PRODUCTIONS Brussels, BELGIUM

Name	Company	Position
Sebastien De Valck	Bbdo Belgium	Creative director
Arnaud Pitz	Bbdo Belgium	Creative director
Frédéric Zouag	Bbdo Belgium	Art Director
Nicolas Gaspart	Bbdo Belgium	Creative Copywriter
Jasper Heldenbergh	Bbdo Belgium	videographer
Christophe Malotaux	Bbdo Belgium	Graphic Designer
Patricia Van De Kerckhove	Bbdo Belgium	TV Producer
Lore Desmet	Bbdo Belgium	Account Manager
Isabel Peeters	Bbdo Belgium	Chief Commercial Officer
Stefan Ceunen	Bbdo Belgium	Social media director
Fred De Loof	Witloof Productions	Art Director

The Campaign

Love Condom is a challenger brand of condoms in Belgium. It doesn’t have the media budget to rival big names like Durex or Manix. To stand out in this extremely competitive sector, it needed to find a way of communicating that was different from its competitors’ methods. Love Condom therefore decided to run an awareness campaign exactly 9 months before the start of the UEFA European Championship. This is one tournament that Belgians are really looking forward to. And for good reason: the Belgian team has been notching up plenty of wins lately, is ranked first in the FIFA rankings and is among the favourites in France. Love Condom set to work and designed an awareness ad using the personal account of Philippe, a Belgian who missed his team’s victory in the quarter-finals of the 1986 World Cup in Mexico. A result that still today remains the best result in Belgian football history. The reason he missed the match: he became a dad that evening. In the video, he explains his agony and ends his story by warning all Belgians not to make the same mistake he made, and to wear condoms. This film was released exactly 9 months ahead of the launch of the UEFA European Championship in France. It also provided input for discussions and was widely disseminated by all journalists in the country. So this is how a small brand stood out and was able to raise awareness among Belgian supporters.

With a crazy budget, the online ad found itself on TV and was seen by thousands of people. The main press sites, sports press sites, blogs and supporters’ sites shared the film to make their readers aware. The country’s sports programmes showed the ad and talked about it during their programmes.

We started with a real event. Several Belgians missed a historic moment for Belgium; the qualification of Belgium for the semi-finals of the Football World Cup in 1986. We therefore created content based around this event. Our story focuses on the personal experience of Philippe, a Belgian who explains how he missed this historic moment and who sends a warning out to Belgians so that they don’t make the same mistake he made. His story was broadcast on the internet exactly 9 months before kick-off at the UEFA European Championship in Belgium. Media organisations and TV channels were quick to pick up on it. And so our message was rapidly spread around, enabling us to save a few Belgians...