CIBA Animal Health: Program

When Earle Palmer Brown/NY's creative team of John Fraioli and Robin Tzannes had to come up with a different approach to sell Ciba Animal Health's new treatment to control fleas in dogs and cats, they began to think of animation as an interesting alternative. With animation, their pet protagonists could talk and express their fears.

And the team wanted the central characters, a dog named Henry and a cat named Molly, to be both lovable and sympathetic - for the pet owner to put themselves in their pet's position of fearing what sort of torture this new flea control product would produce. They picked Norm Bendell, noted humorous illustrator, to design Henry and Molly and their owner because of his sophisticated and funny style. Buzzco Associates was chosen, not only because of their breadth of experience, but also because they had worked with Norm on other projects for Southwestern Bell, ClearBlue Easy, Xerox, Budget Gourmet, and ABC/Capital Cities.

There were 5 spots, Henry's Nightmare, Acrobatics, Double Nightmare, Summer Dreams and Through the Fence.

At the same time, the B2B advertising wanted to keep the branding and added a little music video to their sales film It's Hard to Harm a Flea.

These ads were wildly successful and won Effies two years in a row. But, unfortunately, Ciba was sold to another manufacturer and the campaign was scrapped!

Vinny and I loved working with Norm Bendell and the Ciba campaign was a favorite. Not only were the spots good-- they were "effective"! They won Effies for both years of the campaign.  And as nice as it was working with Norm, the ad team was equally a delight as was their client. This was probably one of the best experiences I had in advertising!


Credits

For the television campaigns:

Agency: Earle Palmer Brown
Agency Producer: Amy Sheldon
Agency Art Director: John Fraioli
Agency Writer: Robin Tzannes
Agency Creative Director: Michael Drazen
Account Supervisor: Jonathan Frattaroli
Account Executive: Suzanne Losquadro

Production House: Buzzco Associates, Inc.
Directors: Candy Kugel and Vincent Cafarelli
Designer: Norm Bendell
Animators: Vincent Cafarelli/Vincent Bell
Camera: George Davis

For Hard to Harm a Flea

Agency: Veterinary Learning Systems

Producer: Pat Burns

Animation: Buzzco Associates, inc.

Directors: Candy Kugel and Vincent Cafarelli

Design: Norm Bendell

Animator: Vincent Cafarelli

Jingle: Lanny Meyers / Lanstronaut

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