Ad of the Day: Progressive’s Baby Man Is About to Spit Up in Your Facebook Feed

Actually, make that baby. Progressive Insurance is changing things up with a new campaign from Arnold featuring a wise-cracking man-child character and a new delivery platform—Facebook Premium Video Ads.

The "Baby Man" campaign features just that—a grown man who acts like a baby. He's carried around his office in a baby carrier, slugs juice from a sippy cup and cracks jokes at his colleagues' expense. All of the ads end with a punching sound as the screen slams to white and a gruff voice announces: "Act your age! Dump your parents' insurance company."

"Save @ Progressive.com" then appears on screen.

The humor isn't exactly subtle. One of the 15-second spots opens with the Baby Man farting, then blaming it on a co-worker. Another ends with him spitting up on his mom. It's all part of a strategy of broad, visually arresting comedy that Progressive hopes grabs millennials' attention when the spots autoplay (users must click for sound) on Facebook.

"This creative is different than anything people have seen from us before, and was designed for the [Facebook] placement," Jonathan Beamer, Progressive's marketing strategy and innovation business leader, tells Adweek.

"Our goal is to break through the clutter of the newsfeed and to inspire people to evaluate their own insurance choices. Nobody should blindly accept his or her parents' choice—if young adults haven't reevaluated their insurance choices, they are probably not getting the value they deserve."

Baby Man is a significant new initiative for Progressive, and he also has his own section on the Progressive website. But longtime spokeswoman character Flo isn't going anywhere, the company added.

Indeed, she might want to join this campaign and whip the Baby Man into shape.

CREDITS

Client: Progressive Insurance

Agency: Arnold Worldwide

Executive Creative Directors: Pete Johnson, Wade Devers

Group Creative Director: Sean McBride 

Art Director: Alyssa Wilson Georg

Copywriter: Joshua Kahn

Producers: Jaime Guild, Kathy McMann

Assistant Producer: Lauren Landry

Business Affairs: Kim Stevens, Lisa Mercier

Planner: Milla Stolte

Marketing Producers: Elliott Seaborn, Val Bettini, Caitlin Moran, Kelley Stenberg, Dorothy Johnson

Social Media: Matt Karolian, Brandon Schug, Cristin Barth

Production Company: 3rd Street Mining Company

Production Company Executive Producer: John LaChapelle

Production Company Line Producer: Barry Heaps

Director: Ben Hurst, Dave Thomas

Cinematographer: Munn Powell

Editorial Company: Editbar

Editor: Reuter

Audio Mix: Brian Heidebrecht, Soundtrack Boston

Color, Conform, Clean Up, Rig Removal: Zero VFX