Monday, July 6, 2009

Levi's Go Forth


Levi's latest campaign, “Go Forth”, attempts to reinforce the Levi brand as the original working class hero, the pilgrim settler and the revolutionary patriot. Driven through tv, radio and internet, Strauss & Co. have gone back to their roots, paying homage to the pioneer spirit, declaring...

"I am the new American pioneer, looking forward, never back. No longer content to wait for better times… I will work for better times. ‘Cause no one built this country in suits. All I need is all I got. Bruises heal. Stink is good. Apathy is death. So I strike up for the new world! A new mightier world. The one I will make to my liking. For after the darkness comes the dawn. There is a better tomorrow. Look across the plains and mountains and see America's eternal promise. A promise of progress. Go forth with me, go forth."

Developed by Wieden + Kennedy the campaign aims to write the New Declaration of the Unites States of American. The new site, Go Forth, features the new declaration and users are told... “Take up your pen, you general of the new revolution. Add your words, your images, your voice to a new declaration, redefined in the spirit of today’s America. An America in which we hold these truths to be self-evident…”

A brave and bold aim you might think, but considering 'Obama's America' and the dreams that it has instilled in much of it's people, this seems like the perfect platform and call to action to reinvigorate a jaded and tired consumer. The imagery is vivid and inspiring, asking only that people pulled themselves up, knuckle down through hard times, and get the job done.

In a perfect fit,
the tv ad for the campaign features an original wax recording of Walt Whitman reading his poem “America" overlayed on black and white vinettes. The ad is viewable on the site as well as a host of downloadable content including an MP3 of the Whitman recording, various wallpaper and larger posters.

Executive creative director Susan Hoffman describes Levi's ambition as a want to “refresh and reinvent the idea of a pioneering spirit for the times in which we live”.

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