We knew that if we wanted to launch an international brand we had to give it an international look and feel. We believe you only get one introduction. Part of the brand-building exercise was to create a solid brand film which would capture the brand’s essence, it’s story and portray a strong message people could relate to - no pressure ;-) We knew this would be a challenge, but it was a challenge we were willing to accept. We wanted to capture what it was to be a true gentleman, for us it was looking back at the influence certain men had in our lives growing up, our fathers, our grandfather etc. Here’s the core essence we came up with:
Generational Gentlemen - an emotionally nostalgic brand film.
Generations lock up sentimental value and memories which are untouched and special. These memories are passed down generations and rooted back to the value added to them. It's inevitable. The love a son has for his father and a father for his son. A son’s mission is to one day make his father proud. A father’s greatest fulfillment is to one day see his son change from a boy to a man and succeed in this world. By birth a son strives for his father’s approval and the hardest thing for a son to do is to talk to his father about his feelings. Some of the deepest emotions are sometimes never spoken about. It’s shown.
Once we wrote the script the challenge was to figure out how we would actually execute this brand film idea we had. We wanted to showcase two parts in the brand film:
Tell a story about a young man getting ready for his day sharing the same values his father used to get ready for his day accompanied by an authoritative elderly male voice-over.
Show a montage of relevant, dapper and street style gentlemen roaming the streets of Cape Town.
In essence, we wanted the brand film to activate the gentleman ‘locked up’ in every man and also showcase that any man can be a gentleman. It’s a life choice.
We tried pitching the idea to a number of different agencies and production companies but got rejected a few times...until a mutual friend got us a presentation opportunity with a production company called Responsive.
We will never forget the moment we got the opportunity to pitch our idea to the Humann Films team. To raise the stakes even higher, our mutual friend and the production company didn’t know what we were going to pitch so this was a complete shot in the dark for both parties... We came prepared, pitched our idea boldly, with self-confidence and had a clear vision and mission - guess that’s where preparation meets opportunity?! Our audience listened and a week later we found out Responsive was onboard! We recorded the voice-over creating the foundation for the visuals. The next thing was to start planning the production of the physical shoot.
By this time majority of our start-up budget had been depleted and we literally went on favors from our actor and model friends, borrowing apartments and bugging almost anyone who was willing to help out for free product - and yes you can still pay people in product :-)
The whole brand film was shot in two days. Day one we shot the main scenes for the opening segment in our friend’s apartment and the second part of the brand film ‘montage’ was shot in the streets of Cape Town. One of the biggest challenges when filming almost any visual content is making sure the end result and message is exactly what you had in mind from the beginning - lucky for us there were no egos or hierarchy in our team and Responsive delivered beyond our expectations. This taught us the importance of communication and transparency and also giving people their creative freedom and space to work the way they work.
Here it is, WEEF’s Iconic brand film and also a symbol to myself and Patrick that anything is possible if you are passionate enough:
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