In 2017, brand ambassador Jogi Löw received prominent support from none other than star chef Tim Mälzer during that year's annual NIVEA MEN promotion. Together, they created the cookbook '#Erfolgsrezepte,' filled with dishes that are not only truly high-quality but also really delicious.
And with the help of our two powerhouses cooking and promoting the campaign on all channels, we became the most successful brand activation for NIVEA MEN in terms of media awareness, conversion, and reach to that date.
This project is actually the first idea that truly originated from me and materialized just as I envisioned it. Let me explain—I was a junior AD, still seeking notable successes for my ideas and concepts. Working on the Nivea Men creative team, our task was clear-cut: come up with a novelty item for the annual Jogi promotion, boosting Beiersdorf's product sales. The previous year's success was hard to top—a towel with a tactical drawing of the winning goal that clinched Germanys World Cup victory. It sold like hotcakes. So, when the brief arrived, urging us to replicate that success, the pressure was on. My first ever idea for the promotion was #Erfolgsrezepte, not just the general concept, but fully pre-visualized with the precise name, design language, and style.
The initial idea was simple: Jogi sharing his favorite dishes, rewritten in football commentary style, with pun-names and a football-themed touch. For weeks, my creative directors hesitated, thinking Beiersdorf and Jogi would never go for it. I was leaning toward agreeing until, out of desperation, my creative director decided to include it as a wildcard in a presentation. The unexpected happened—Beiersdorf loved the idea. They believed we got a real winner, so they invested more, bringing in Tim Mälzer to legitimize and enhance it, transforming our novelty item into a fully functional cookbook by a renowned chef. My initial design and idea turned into the hottest novelty item nivea men ever offered and the first one to actually get the media interested in the promotion itself. According the clients feedback and data, it outperfomed all that came before it - and even pushed the towel firmly on the second place.
The only thing missing for this success story would be critical acclaim within the creative industry itself, and even though the promotion was a huge commercial success with public interest and coverage of the media – it was not send to that years award season, as they forgot to include it in the final deck. Could it have won something, probably. We will sadly never know.
