Major sports footwear New Balance Football partnered with creative agency ZAK to launch their ‘Football’s Next Wave’ campaign, a three-part documentary-series that highlights the subcultures and communities thriving around the game. The video unveils the nascent soccer scene in Atlanta and the idea of aspiring to icons is suddenly flipped and the audience are the heroes. All three videos play host to people who, like the brand, are ready to kick back against the established set of rules. According to ZAK’S CCO, Matt Bennet, the campaign is about creating new definitions of success whereby you don’t need to make it as a pro player in national teams to be deemed successful.
“A lot of the reason why US soccer is not as developed as it should be is because you have to pay to play in. Talent never really got recognised at those higher levels if you couldn’t afford to. No one has a $1,000 to spend on going to play soccer for fun, go outside,” says Sekou Thornell, founder of Kitboys Club, a creative brand collective the blurs the line between urban culture and sport.
The campaign seeks to position New Balance Football as a brand that champions the unconventional: in the series, superstars make way for real talent and traditional football settings make way for more emotive storytelling.
“Football’s Next Wave is influential in the global football game, now more than ever. We’ve worked across the New Balance global brand and with ZAK to identify powerful, influential and emotive stories of how individuals and communities around the world are leaving their own mark on the game we all love,” says Nicola Jones, global senior marketing manager for New Balance Football.
