Coca Cola Polar Bears Party with Penguins

Coca Cola has a polar bear theme going in its advertising. Their most recent ad, however, has the polar bears interacting with penguins. Penguins, of course, live in the Antarctic, not the Arctic where the polar bears live. Still – why let geography get in the way of a good party?

Arctic Beach Party

A bear family is woken by the sounds of a party accompanied by the Beach Boys tune, “Little Saint Nick”. A cub slips down the hill into a group of dancing Emperor penguins enjoying the domino effect. There’s an icy standoff until a small penguin appears and offers the cub a bottle of Coca Cola. The text: “Give. Live. Love.” Click on the image below to play the video.

Credits

The concept for ‘Arctic Beach Party’ was created at advertising agency Berlin Cameron Red Cell New York, by creatives Chris Shipman, Izzy DeBellis and Ewen Cameron, with agency producer Chris Kyriakos.

Production company Passion Pictures assembled a large team for the ad, including directors/editors Pierre Coffin and Kyle Balda, art director/painter Daniel Cacouault, producer Erika Forzy and executive producer Hugo Sands.

Visual effects were developed at MacGuff, Los Angeles, under the direction of Etienne Pecheux, with executive producer Jacques Bled and producer Christelle Balcon and Freddie Fechner. Animation was developed by Kyle Balda, Pierre Leduc and Christophe. Petit Lighting was developed by Emmanuel Jarry, Oliver Luffin. Modelling was developed by Jerome Gordon, Franck Clarenc. Sound was designed at Mit Out Sound by Ren Klyce. Editing was done by Brandon Boudreaux at Day for Night.

Earlier Coke Polar Bears

This is the tenth Coca Cola television advertisement featuring polar bears.

Coca Cola first introduced polar bears into their television advertising in 1993 with a low-budget spot, ‘Northern Lights” in which polar bears drink coke and view the aurora borealis or northern lights.

Click on the image below to play the video.

Advertising agency, Creative Artists Agency, Beverly Hills included in their creative team Shelly Hochron and Len Fink, Kenneth Stewart. Production company was Sierra Hotel Productions. Animation Company Rhythm & Hues. Polar . The ad won a gold Hugo award in 1994, first place at the Digital Hollywood Awards.

Coca Cola followed the polar bear ad up with two spots designed for the Winter Olympics: “Jump” – Baby bear cubs select a Christmas tree, and “Luge” – created for the 1994 Olympic Games.

Craig Talmy at Rhythm & Hues directed animation for “Sledding”, which features adult polar bears drinking Coca Cola after a natural snow sledding run with the family. Click on the image below to play the Sledding video.

Other Polar Advertising

Polar bears and penguins appear to be the favourites for animators in the film industry.

Bill Kroyer animated Hankook Tyres, “Bear Bump”, in which a penguin, a seal and a walrus slide towards the sea, only to be stopped by a polar bear with wheel tread grip on its paws.

Steve Beck directed animation for BMW “Penguin”, featuring a penguin without traction encountering a BMW in the snow.