As Nestlé Japan approached its 100 year anniversary, the company felt the brand’s image as an innovative company had begun to weaken. Our task was to revitalize this image and give the brand a new sense of youth. Nestlé happens to share its centennial with Japanese cinema, so we brought the two together to tell a story of innovation and creativity.

Directors everywhere face the challenge of not being able to shoot movies the way they want to: restrictions, such as sponsor and investor demands, often force them to compromise their vision to appease the people and entities funding the production. So, we offered six famous directors the opportunity to produce films their way, without restrictions or product placement demands. We chose directors who were influencers and who would help revitalize Nestlé Japan’s innovative image.

Each film would have a Nestlé Trailer, which would be the only place the viewer would see product placement or the Nestlé name or subsidiary brand names. Nestlé Trailer offered Nestlé a platform to deliver their message in a manner consistent with the film to create seamless brand entertainment.

These films were featured on the Nestlé Japan YouTube channel, Nestlé Theater. Using YouTube as a platform allowed users to easily share the films, and within three months, Nestle Theater received over 5 million views. The nearly unheard of concept of funding directors to shoot what they wanted yielded positive results to strengthen and add a sense of youth to the brand.

We scouted directors we felt had a strong influence on the general public and approached them to join the project.

In the beginning, we started with six directors. Later, many more came asking if they too could be part of Nestlé Theater—for a total of 11 directors at this time.

The films were shot and uploaded onto the Nestlé Japan YouTube site in the fall of 2013. There are now plans to send their movies out to film festivals in 2014.

·5,000,000 views in 2 month

·consumer comments were extremely positive, and spread by social media not just in Japan but around the world.