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Supporting Irish Food Heroes.

Posted on May 17, 2012 by Niamh.Moore

We all know times are tough – it’s hard for everyone in the current climate. Here at McCann’s we’ve decided to get on the ‘positive’ train and celebrate Irish heroes that are leading the charge for Irish business – especially in the export market.

One of my favourite ‘heroes’ I want to commend is Glenilen Farm. I came across their wonderful yoghurts some time ago and thought I had stumbled across a wonderful secret artisan producer that no one else discovered. I’m delighted to say that I was wrong and that in fact Glenilen Farm in West Cork has been hailed by Bord Bia as one of the success stories of the Irish export market.

This wonderful family business employs 35 people, produces dairy desserts, yoghurts, creams and butter from the milk of their own dairy herd. The company are enjoying increased success in the UK and are distributed by Tesco, Waitrose, EH Booths and Ocado as well as independent retailers.

Their export success is echoed among many Irish companies with the recent Deloitte Food and Beverage Survey 2012 showing that just over half the companies surveyed have seen improvements in the export market in the past 12 months. In challenging times its also promising that 95pc of respondents in this survey also stated that they are continuing to invest in their business.

So congratulations to Alan and Valerie Kingston of Glenilen Farm for showing us all what can be done with hard work, a dream and a superb range of products!

And to all our clients involved in production and export of quality Irish food such as Bord Bia and Kerry Foods – Keep the flag flying!

OKI anticipates

Posted on May 15, 2012 by Shay.Madden

This week saw the launch of our new campaign for OKI. The interesting thing we discovered while talking to our client, Martin, was that OKI can remotely supervise all your print equipment from their own headquarters. Which means they’ll notice if you are about to run out of toner, or a printer needs servicing, before you do. It’s like they have a magic ability to anticipate everything. Here’s our radio commercial brilliantly performed by Paul Woodful and Mario Rosenstock. The print ad was illustrated by Jonathan McHugh. Enjoy.

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Free Things to Do in Dublin.

Posted on April 24, 2012 by Yvonne.Otoole

There are so many different things going on around this fair city of ours over the coming months – it will be hard to see them all! But there a couple of FREE things you might like to stick in your diary over the next few weeks.

For the nerds and geeks among us you probably know Dublin is the City of Science 2012 – and from April 27th to June 1st the Science Gallery is hosting a terrific exhibition called ‘Happy’ (asking why are the Irish one of the most upbeat nations in the world!) See www.sciencegallery.ie

May 10th to June 14th sees the return of the popular Sunday Times Outdoor Film Festival at Meeting House Square. Although FREE you need to book tickets in advance for this one at www.templebar.ie from April 29th.

May 25th is ‘Africa Day’ and there’s lots of events planned exploring African culture over that weekend. Expect vibrant , colourful and lively activities around the city – in fact volunteers are being sought so if you fancy taking part see www.africaday.ie for more info.

Finally from now until May 12th , there’s a wonderful show by digital artist Phil McDarby at The Cooper House Gallery (off Synge St) . This showcase ‘Into The Greenwood Deep’ captures ‘his imagining of a magical woodland populated by benevolent dragons and mythical spirits’ . The minutae of Phils forests and woodlands are amazing at this scale – and it is definitely worth whisking yourself off to his enchanted forest for an hour or so! For more details and opening times see www.thecopperhousegallery.com

A new point of view for Three Prepay.

Posted on March 28, 2012 by Emma.Sharkey

We’re very excited about our new campaign for Three Prepay.

Check out the TV below.

In this campaign we’re demonstrating the sort of interesting things a Three customer can do with their phone because they have All You Can Eat Data.

The commercial was produced by Gary Moore of RedRage.

Our director was Michael Geoghegan who did a great job creating our unique POV look.

The track was composed by Gavin Little of Echolab, and the sound was done by Mark Richards of Mutiny.

Enjoy!

Orlaith Blaney presents at CBS Outdoor Interactive Europe in London

Posted on March 26, 2012 by Orlaith.Blaney

Antionette O’Callaghan at CBS Outdoor invited us to present at their Interactive Europe Research presentation to a European wide industry gathering at Westfield in London last week. Whilst the ladies ooh’ed and aah’ed about the fantastic shops at the highly impressive Westfield, the gentlemen in the group were more excited about the Olympic stadium being built directly beside the Westfield site.

The International Marketing Director for CBS Outdoor, Anna Reeves lead a very impressively and immaculately put together presentation on a major piece of research conducted for CBS Outdoor by Kantar on Interactive Outdoor-Insights and Opportunities. Nick Astley and the Mindshare London team presented on Nike campaign for the Olympics. We presented on our interactive can dispenser activity for Coca-Cola at Christmas, where we used interactive 6 sheets at 7 Shopping Centre locations to distribute 50,000 free cans of Coke.

Delightfully, I was also able to present the Dublin Does Fridays campaign which combined strong outdoor multi format activity with excellent online and social media activity. Sarah Sherry and Jonathan Forrest at Cybercom and client for Vintners Federation of Ireland, Valerie Rice allowed me to present the case study on their behalf. The work by Cawley Nea/TBWA and Cybercom was thought by the audience to be a brilliant and effective way to use outdoor to drive social media conversation. My stories explaining ‘The Forty Foot’’ and why you’d have shrivelly bits after a trip there got a big reaction.

Finally, all of the European teams are keen to go to Coppers, on their next visit. A long day in London but a brilliant one. Thank you to everyone at CBS Outdoor. We will certainly be including more ‘Interactive’ outdoor ideas in our 2012 client plans. If you want a copy of the research, get in touch with Antoinette.ocallaghan@cbsoutdoor.ie.

Get the most out of your iPhone 4S with Three.

Posted on March 14, 2012 by Onagh.Carolan

Are you getting the most out of your iPhone 4S? Here’s our new commercial for Three Mobile which advertises the fact that you get all the data you can eat on your Three Mobile iPhone for just over €40 a month. With this brilliant offer, you can download, watch TV & stream movies as much as you like. The talented illustrator Chris Judge together with post house The Element designed the animated hands over which comedian Paddy C.Courtney delivers the voiceover. Take a look at the ad below…

Raid Your Closets for Concern !

Posted on March 8, 2012 by Yvonne.Otoole

Today is International Women’s Day and Heather Ann McSharry at Concern Ireland asked us if we’d like to host a coffee morning to support them and in particular the work they are doing with women in some of the worlds’ poorest countries. We were more than happy to help but we decided to go a step further. We asked our colleagues to ‘Raid Their Closet’ and bring in their ‘pre-loved’ items of clothing, jewellery, shoes and scarves - the lot! People were very generous and donated some gorgeous items and if they didn’t have anything to donate they made up for it by purchasing items themselves. We had a lovely coffee station with sweet treats (always popular) and let people browse through our little Aladdins’ Cave at their leisure. So far we have managed to raise €425 ! A fantastic result for a very worthwhile cause. So a big thank you to ALL the ladies of Hambleden House your support is very much appreciated!

Egos spiral out of control in McCanns

Posted on March 5, 2012 by Ray.Swan

We just won the NNI Press Ad of the Month for January 2012, for our Health and Safety Authority, Farm Safety ad.

Like every ad it’s a collaborative effort and there are so many people involved who we would like to thank.
Our wonderful clients in the HSA,
Our photographer, the beautiful Kevin Griffin.
Our Creative Director, Mr. Shay Madden Esq.
Our Client Service team of Charlotte Sangster (RIP) and Martina Martinez.
Our marvelous studio.
Our Planner, Mr. Sean Whittaker.
Our MD, Ms. Orlaith Blaney.

But, we’d rather thank ourselves.
So thank you Ray, thank you Emma.
Without your singular vision and indomitable spirit, none of this would be possible.
You are our heroes.

Star of a million sandwiches.

Posted on February 29, 2012 by Shay.Madden

This week sees the launch of our new ‘Ham and Bacon’ commercial for Bord Bia. This time round we are encouraging people to choose Ham and Bacon with the Bord Bia Quality Mark. As with the other two commercials in this series, it was beautifully directed by Brian Durnin of Red Rage Films. And the ladies of Ireland will be delighted to see it also hails the return of Lochlann O’Mearain as the presenter! Enjoy.

Fancy a Career Reboot?

Posted on February 28, 2012 by Andrea.Galligan

We have just launched Microsoft’s new Career Reboot campaign with press, online, radio and PR support. There are currently 1,000 unfilled jobs in the technology sector and the Government has committed to funding conversion courses for people with the relevant qualifications, to transfer their skills and gain new employment. A good news story finally!!
The event will be hosted by Microsoft on March 3rd in their offices in Sandyford, where they will have prospective employers to interview with as well as the colleges that are facilitating the 10 month FREE conversion courses.
For more information check out their website.

RTE cover Irish brand stories on The Business with George Lee

Posted on February 28, 2012 by Orlaith.Blaney

Last night on the RTE programme, The Business, we had a trip down memory lane on some of the really powerful ads of the past and a nod to today’s work. Featured on the programme was ‘Coming Home’ from Aer Lingus, where the power of a plane landing on Irish soil and the warmth of their cabin crew made you feel really positive about our Irish airline. We had some smiles too, from No Nonsense (QMP Publicis) and Lyons Tea (Rothco) capturing our brilliant Irish humour. Campaign ideas from ourselves on Tayto (Looking for Love and Mr Tayto book – the Man Inside the Jacket) and Chemistry who did Mr Tayto Election also made the cut for the programme celebrating powerful Irish brands.

John Fanning told us about ‘Maverick’ for farmers. That powerful device at the end where Maverick is burnt into wood is highly memorable. Well done to George Lee, Marie Toft and Valerie Ringrose Fitzsimons and the team at RTE for a well put together programme. If you missed it, you’ll find it on RTE Player. To note too, Bronagh Twomey, Group Head of Marketing and the great client behind the ‘No Nonsense’ campaign will share her story at Marketing @ Night event, supported by Edelman, on Wednesday 29th February from 6.30pm to 8.00pm. Bronagh will address the theme “Don’t give up on Differentiation – The No Nonsense Insurance story”. The challenge was how could FBD Insurance differentiate itself within the insurance market to maintain growth and continue to capture market share. The venue is Edelman, 5th Floor, Huguenot House, 37 St Stephens Green, Dublin 2. MII Members €20, Non-Members €30. Contact ; cecilia@mii.ie, +353 1 216 0156

Watch the show on the RTE player HERE

A Little Lolly Goes A Long Way!

Posted on February 23, 2012 by Andrea.Galligan

We celebrated the launch of the Oesophageal Cancer Fund’s Lollipop Day today in McCann’s with a cakeathon. Look at these happy faces!

Join us at the Lollipop Day main event tomorrow on Henry Street at 1pm with Sinead Desmond and the Dublin Gospel Choir.

There are about 400 new cases of oesophageal cancer in Ireland each year. Prognosis is poor with 90% of patients dying of their cancer. Approximately the same number of people die from oesophageal cancer as there are road traffic deaths in Ireland each year. Funds raised from Lollipop Day will be directed into funding for research into the disease.

To donate or find out more look HERE

Steve Simpson – Saved from a Life of Pies

Posted on February 13, 2012 by Andrea.Galligan

We were psyched to have Steve Simpson with us in the Agency for a beer and a chat on a Friday afternoon.

Steve gave up his part time job in the pie factory in Northwich (where he grew up) and went on to work on comics ‘The Dandy’ and ‘Beano’ and later classic 1980’s animation on ‘Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ and ‘Count Duckula’.

His latest work for local Irish clients Inferno Sauce and Cavistons coffee really demonstrate his unique skill at pack design; even his bar codes are beautifully illustrated.

Steve has worked with McCann’s on HB Ice-cream and Lollipop Day in the past as well as a host of big brands including Vodafone and 7-up.

Steve is also one of the guest speakers at Offset this year – to read more about Steve’s work go here: http://www.stevesimpson.com/

A massive step change for Dairygold.

Posted on February 8, 2012 by Emma.Sharkey

Last week our integrated campaign for Dairygold launched. After thirty years of telling the Irish public to spread Dairygold on bread, we’re now letting you know that you can also scoop it, dollop it, and even melt it on all sorts of tasty foods, especially your family’s veg. It’s a simple thought, but one that has a good chance of changing how people use this classic Irish brand. The commercial was shot by Richie Smyth using some pretty cool probe lenses to get up close to the beautiful, melting Dairygold. In addition to TV, print and radio, we teamed up with Goosebump and RMG Target to create a very impactful through the line campaign. Check out some of the work below.

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McCanns sign up new talent.

Posted on February 7, 2012 by Orlaith.Blaney

Sally Ann O’Donovan has recently joined the client service team – Sally Ann is one of the most experienced and senior strategic 360’ marketers in the Irish market with both senior agency management, brand, digital and client management experience.

For 3 years she led the McConnell’s Fusion team to major success working on integrated marketing campaigns for Kelloggs, Coca-Cola, Dundrum Town Centre, Tesco and BMW/Mini. She has also worked with Bord Bia to create their new brand to promote buying fresh Irish fruit and vegetables when in season, which involved the development of a website, social media and radio campaign to support launch of new brand.

Sally Ann has also extensive client side experience and was Marketing Director for Mount Falcon Hotel and Residential development for a contract period and held a Board position as Marketing Director at Xtra-Vision PLC. Prior to these roles, she was MD at McConnells Direct working for Kelloggs, The Irish Times, IDA, Walt Disney, Ballygowan and Bord na Mona on effective 360’ campaigns bringing ideas right through the line, seamlessly and effectively.

As-well as being a brilliant strategic and effective marketer, Sally Ann also has an interest in the theatre, photography and the outdoors.