Alexandre Okada was announced by DLKW Lowe as their new global creative director for Persil in a statement made yesterday. Okada will be relocating from his native Brazil to the agency's London offices, where he'll be leading their creative department across the network dedicated to the Unilever detergent brand on the brand's “Dirt is good” campaign, which recently turned out the stunning “Whatever life throws” TV spot. Unilever has been one of Lowe and Partners' largest global clients for over 50 years now, and as well as handling the Persil brand in more than 30 markets worldwide, the agency also handles Unilever brands such as Magnum, Clear, Signal, Rexona and Knorr.
Okada will be relocating from his native Brazil to the agency's London offices, where he'll be leading their creative department across the network dedicated to Persil
Okada returns to the North American ad game following a stint as general creative director at Publicis Spain. Previously, he had spent a long spell in his home country, leading the team for current Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff's campaign, serving as VP and CCO of McCann Brazil and co-directing and filming projects for the Bradesco Foundation, owners of the second biggest bank in Brazil. Prior to his time in Brazil, he worked for Leo Burnett Latin American in Miami. It was during his time at Leo Burnett that he worked on the “Time to Change your Ideas” campaign for Fiat, which is perhaps one of most well-known pieces of work. He created this campaign whilst working for Leo Burnett in Brazil, but has also worked for the agency in Portugal as ECD, where, whilst under his leadership, the agency won numerous prestigious accounts, including McDonald's.
Alexandre Okada
Helen Bell, the chief operations officer at Lower for Unilever says that Okada “Has the international credentials that are pivotal to a role like this.” He believes Okada understands the Persil brand “On a global level, which has always been key to its success,” and he looks forward to seeing how this understanding will help them take the brand forward. Okada himself adds that he feels Persil is an emblematic brand, which is perceived as being local and is “Loved in every country,” even though it's global. He says that “Lowe and Unilever have built together a great story of success” and feels it will be a great challenge to “work for brands with such amazing potential.”
Okada feels Persil is an emblematic brand, which is perceived as being local and is “Loved in every country,” even though it's global
In more DLKW Lowe news; the agency has recently been invited by the Crown Commercial Service to pitch for a campaign that will promote public awareness about the future divestments of UK Financial Investments, the body that manages the Government's shareholdings in UK banks. It's thought that because the Government is keen to get some sort of return from its stakeholders ahead of the next general election, the resulting public awareness campaign could be one of the largest and most involved since the heyday of privatisation during the 80s.
Benjamin Hiorns is a freelance writer, musician and lifelong Persil user from the UK. He tried Fairy Liquid once and his cutlery has never been the same since!
