How The Farmer's Dog was able to win the game thanks to its Emmy-nominated commercial
For the staff at The Farmer's Dog, the purpose of their very first Super Bowl ad was simple to make viewers cry.
"There was a line in the brief which is basically, "if you don't get the viewers to cry that's a failure," says filmmaker Goh Iromoto, who brought The Farmer's Dog now-iconic (and Emmy-nominated!) advertisement "Forever" to the world of. "I'll never forget that line. This was an extremely important motivator, in terms of creativity, in my case."
We were interested in learning more about the spot Staff-Picked -- which was the top-rated ad in the 2023 Super Bowl and has gone on to receive an Emmy nomination (!) So we met with Goh and The Farmer's Dog's creative team at The Farmer's Dog to find out more about their fantastic collaboration process, their meticulous outline, and the dog who helped inspire the campaign. Check out the show's major takeaways. Or, you can watch the whole conversation on YouTube.
| Project name | "Forever" The Farmer's Dog |
| Stakeholders |
Teressa Iezzi Director of Creative and Content
Sophie Forman, Director of Brand Design |
| Objectives of the campaign |
Teressa and Sophie were looking to develop an ad that embodied their corporate slogan, "Long Live Dogs."
The company has historically been focusing its ads on the nitty-gritty aspects of its products. But Teressa and Sophie were aware that the Q1 campaign had to clearly bring its mission to help dogs live longer, happier healthy lives to life in a different way. |
| Goals |
• Recreate The Farmer's Dog mission and rallying cry with a powerful, artistic way
* Tell an emotional story that goes beyond the specifics of the product. |
| Timeline |
The entire campaign took four month from top to tail to run, with the structure of the campaign looking like this:
October | Brief stage November | Goh shares his pitch with the team December | Shoot January | Post-production February Live! |
| Resources | The Farmer's Dog team worked incredibly closely with Goh to generate the final product. Goh played the role of creative director and project director, while Teressa and Sophie were key players in shaping the project. The three worked in close collaboration in the development process from start until the end. |
| The most important lessons |
* Invest in your brief
* Focus on the story and not on the product * Great work deserves great promotion |