After signing the professional golfer to an endorsement deal in January, Coca-Cola wanted W+K Portland to make an ad with Jordan Spieth reaching for an ice cold bottle of Coke during a hot day on a Texas golf course. They ran into one big problem though: rain. Lots of it. When they tried to reschedule the shoot, the forecast once again called for lots and lots of rain. So W+K Portland and Coca-Cola rolled with the punches, changing the creative concept on the fly, with the spot’s new framework imitating the real life impediments to their original plan.
“Rain” depicts Spieth in his RV while waiting for the rain to stop to film a commercial. So how does a pro golfer like Spieth kill an hour? By reaching for a cold Coke and sinking a bunch of trick shots, naturally. Set to the Missy Elliott classic ” The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly),” the results are rather charming and fun, all the more so knowing the story behind the ad.
“It was a very high stress environment,” Peggy Loos, vice president of connections activation for Coca-Cola North America, told AdAge in an interview discussing the shoot. “We literally walked in on that shoot day not sure which concept we were shooting. Everyone was monitoring the weather hour-by-hour. Since it was very dark and gloomy we decided to go with the second concept that had just been created within the last 36 hours.”
Funnily enough, once W+K and Coca-Cola committed to the new concept and began filming, the rain stopped. “Wieden & Kennedy had to bring in rain towers to create the rain for that part of the shot,” Loos added.
The spot made its first appearance on the brand’s social channels today and will make its broadcast debut Saturday during Fox’s coverage of the U.S. Open.