Our 112-year-old client Gillette faced a world where young men were slacking off shaving. Hollywood and pop culture continued to promote the stubble look, and suddenly the shaving products giant was in danger of losing this crucial demographic to lazy habits and edgier competitors.

They needed a clean-shaven champion. We delivered the ultimate superhero.

For decades, the comic book fan base had been debating how Superman shaved, given that his skin appeared impervious to nuclear missiles. With the release of the 2013 blockbuster “Man of Steel,” in which Clark Kent grows from scraggly young man with unkempt facial hair to well-groomed superhero, the creative team saw the perfect opportunity. So we approached Gillette with a campaign to make Superman himself the face of clean-shaven masculinity.

Joining forces with a summer blockbuster was a coup, but impressing a demographic that resisted branded content remained a challenge. Instead of directly promoting Gillette products as the answer, we orchestrated a super-geek debate to stir up the internet, recruiting fan-friendly celebrities including The Mythbusters and Bill Nye to offer competing super-human shaving theories and amusing YouTube videos. With the ideal mix of street credit and mock gravity, the “How Does the Man of Steel Shave?” campaign flew off its online channels and into mainstream media, delivering Gillette’s product superiority “stealth” message to a massive pop culture audience.

The campaign became the most impactful digital ROI in brand history and drove unprecedented sales at one of P&G’s largest retailers. Just as we predicted, Superman saved the day.

Super speculation spurs serious engagement

The team researched and recruited celebrity super-geeks and real-life Superman enthusiasts to share and promote their shaving theories, including indie film legend and comic book aficionado Kevin Smith; Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage -- hosts of “MythBusters;” real-life engineer and media personality Bill Nye, the Science Guy; and “The Big Bang Theory” actress and real-life neuroscientist Mayim Bialik.

The agency created amusing videos that illustrated each celebrity theory, from “Kryptonite razor” to “whisker-transporting worm hole.” Then we promoted them via HowDoesHeShave.com, a custom-skinned Gillette YouTube hub. Our audience was invited to view theories, share comments and vote on their favourite. Fans were also encouraged to submit their own theories via Twitter and Facebook using #HowDoesHeShave. A voting mechanism stirred healthy competition among our celebrity super-geeks and activated their own considerable online followings. The team utilized Gillette-owned social channels to amplify exposure, ensuring that the online campaign graduated to full-fledged entertainment news.

The campaign generated 810 million media impressions across 1,467 placements, and 159 million social impressions -- permeating the pop culture target. Top-tier coverage included The New York Times, Mashable, Late Night with Conan O’Brien, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Esquire, USA Today, and The Huffington Post.

The campaign earned:

• 20% awareness among target audience (2X the norm for Gillette.)

• Like/dislike ratio of 19:1 (vs standard 5:1)

• YouTube engagement 6X the industry standard

• Twitter engagement 2X the industry standard

• Facebook Newsfeed 94X Gillette average

• Highest campaign keyword response Gillette ever recorded

• Double digit sales increases of Gillette’s Fusion ProGlide products at P&G’s largest retailer