ABOUT

Channel 4 approached Armoury with a campaign idea to welcome back local high street heroes last summer after the first lockdown. Channel 4 partnered with major brands to donate air time and prime-time ad spots to small, independent retailers.

Together Channel 4 and Armoury teamed up to find local high street heroes all over the UK to feature in their very own prime time TV ad. The opportunity was a once-in-a-lifetime and it was good to be able to give back to the small businesses who had a tough year.

Together we launched a set of 20" co-branded teasers running on-air and across the broadcaster’s social channels calls for independent retailers to feature in the campaign. As well as that we also street cast the shops and characters. On selection, they would each be partnered with one of the donating brands, who along with Channel 4, will fund the production of their advert and the TV spot.

The resulting 30” TV ads were joined together as part of a celebratory ad break takeover to be broadcast on Friday 31st July 2020. The break also aired across E4, Film4, More4 and All4 as well as the broadcaster’s social platforms with hashtag #Back4Business. All businesses were provided with their ad to run on their own social accounts.

The films were conceived and shot by Armoury, with each of the separate businesses being shot by a different Armoury director, the campaign's six-day shooting period across countrywide locations, on a small budget and under strict safety guidelines made for a remarkable challenge.

This was a unique opportunity to create TV ads for local high street businesses that can't afford them. Whilst their presence on the high street is familiar to us all, they don't tend to show up within a primetime TV break. There was a responsibility for us as filmmakers to really make the most of that by reflecting these small businesses in a way that was slightly bombastic but also rooted in integrity. This is what made the project so interesting as it was a chance to allude to TV advertising tropes, whilst also slightly subverting them, and this was born out of a direct result of the Covid 19 Pandemic.