Clean Air Asia lets its (nose) hair down

The campaign seeks to highlight, humorously, that urban populations should not adapt to worsening air quality but actually do something about it. The campaign shows a hair sculptor who creates masterpieces from nasal hair illustrating that more hair in noses filters the increasing amount of pollution.

The initial brief had been issued as part of BBDO’s creative training programme in Singapore, where the basic idea was first produced. The purpose of this programme was to allow the senior members of BBDO’s Creative Council to mentor the young talent from across the region.

Representatives from China, India, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Japan, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the Philippines all participated in the development of the early insights.

This was then developed by the BBDO team in the Philippines, under the guidance of David Guerrero, based in Manila, into the final multimedia campaign.

BBDO Guerrero was also responsible for rebranding the organisation and redesigning the logo to create a future-facing vision for the clean air initiative.

“People look at air pollution like the weather: you complain about it but you can not solve it,” said Sophie Punte, the executive director of Clean Air Asia. “We see that people start wearing masks or buy air filters for their houses and cars, and move away from heavily polluted areas if they can afford it. In short they are adapting to air pollution rather than doing something about it.”

“We decided to use humour to explain to people across the region that there is no need to feel jaded or powerless,” said David Guerrero, chairman of BBDO Guerrero Proximity Philippines.

The Hairy Nose campaign was launched on December 5 at the three-day Better Air Quality (BAQ) 2012 conference, organised by Clean Air Asia. The campaign, which consists of an online video and a micro website where people can check pollution levels in their city and select their own nose hair styles, will be rolled out across China, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Vietnam.