How Deadpool's Vibe Inspired Silly Scenarios for BJ's Wholesale Club
It's a divided world out there. But if there's one thing we can all agree to hate, it's inflation. For BJ's Wholesale Club, inflation meant cost-conscious consumers were dreading going grocery shopping—or even switching to dollar stores. The situation was serious. So BJ's decided to make fun of it.
Humor being extremely subjective, we asked our clients what kind of comedy they had in mind. They replied, "Deadpool." The two of us looked at each other and smiled. This was our kind of client. We explained that while Deadpool probably wasn't going to fly on network TV, we understood the brief loud and clear.
With the help of our team at Terri & Sandy, we came up with "Absurdly Simple Savings," a slightly inane campaign built to remind shoppers that, at BJ's, you can save up to 25 percent off grocery store prices just by walking through the door.
One of the first pieces of content we made under the "Absurdly" banner was a radio spot where two skydivers get distracted by the savings at BJ's and forget to pull their cords. The ad ended with a viscerally macabre double "SPLAT!" Rather than fire us, our clients cracked up, and we knew we were on the right track.
After our teams wrote literally hundreds of potential scripts, we decamped to Bulgaria with director Nalle Sjöblad for the TV shoot. There's an incredible Cold War–era backlot where we were able to film everything from a ship at sea to a Victorian seance session. Four days. Six TV spots. Eleven OLVs. It was a whirlwind production of 14-hour days and semi-awkward full-team spa nights. We were literally finishing sets as actors walked into frame!
From start to finish, this campaign has been a blast. It's not every day that a client lets you promote low gas prices with farts in elevators or announce new store openings while mocking terminal medical diagnoses. Work like this is why we got into this business in the first place. And hopefully we can make plenty more of it in the years to come.
