MasterCard put its account for review in March 1997. Mastercard had believed that Ammirati Puris Lintas’ previous campaign, “Smart Money,” was too transaction\/ benefit-focused and lacked an emotional connection with consumers<\/p>\n\n\n\n
McCann was also pitching. They were told that competition was not just other credit cards but cash and cheques also.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was felt that it was shocking that while Mastercard could be used in more places across the world compared to Visa, Visa was perceived as the aspirational global card and Mastercard was just another ordinary one!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They decided to take the ordinariness of the card and elevate it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Jonathan Cranin, executive creative director along with Joyce King Thomas, led the creative team on this pitch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Multiple ideas were shared and rejected through many brainstorming sessions. McCann was trying to find a unique emotional connection which went beyond the transactional nature of credit cards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In all this, Cranin wrote, \u201cThere are some things money can\u2019t buy. For everything else, there\u2019s MasterCard.\u201d Joyce and art director Jeroen Bours then came up with the \u201cshopping list\u201d approach over the weekend whereby the dollar costs of hot dogs and tickets at a baseball game are rattled off in captions, while the voiceover led up to the crux, \u201cReal conversation with 11-year-old son: priceless.\u201d It closed with the MasterCard logo and the tagline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The idea was feel-good and tugged at the heart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOversized storybooks\u201d wrapped in blue velvet were given. The baseball commercial with a father and kid was presented as a rough cut with a music track. Footage from The Fan, a film starring Robert DeNiro, was used. It was a huge success! Tears welled up in the eyes of some Mastercard team members!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
McCann played a tape from a focus group in which customers were visibly moved, with even large, hefty males acknowledging that it moved them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Here, priceless includes the transaction as part of a much larger experience. The advertisement focuses on a fundamental aspect of people’s lives: the desire to have control over their lives so that they may enjoy them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n