Beefeater 0.0 and Jamiroquai with Damien Le Castrec and Shelley Smoler of Lucky Generals

0:00Damien Le Castrec: Welcome to On Strategy Showcase. I'm Fergus O 'Carroll in Chicago. Fall has officially started here. I think this is the first day that I've noticed that it's starting to get cold in Chicago, like fall cold. I mean, I don't know about you guys, but I love fall cold. I find it easier to escape the cold than it is to escape the heat. At least I can wear a large coat and get away from the cold. We're recording this on Friday, October 16th, and I think this will drop on probably Monday, the 19th of October, which means that in less than two weeks, we will be live with On The Spot. You can see that trusty poster for those of you watching on YouTube, which is behind me here.

0:47Damien Le Castrec: We are live at TBWA Shiat Day. We are doing On The Spot. and on the spot is where planners pitch campaigns they love but never worked on and there's three strategists they each pitch a separate campaign nobody knows what the campaign is going to be until the night there's three strategists three campaigns and one winner and again if you're watching on youtube you'll see the trusty on the spot winners trophy which is behind my shoulder here, which is a beautiful piece of material, absolutely 100 % man-made materials carved from a single piece. And it is presented to the winner. And the winner is decided upon by the live audience, by how loud the applause are at the end of the night.

1:34Damien Le Castrec: So the campaigns are presented. This is totally informal and fun because Lord knows the strategy community and everybody in our industry these days needs some fun. So we're not doing a big heavy topic. We are going to be having fun talking about great work with great people and bringing the whole community together. So please join us. We would love to see you there. It is Wednesday, October 28th from 530 to 730 at TBWA Chiat Day. Our pitching strategists for the evening are Tom Sussman, as Chief Strategy Officer for TBWA Chi at Day. We have Lee McCann as Chief Strategy Officer for InOcean. And for those of you who don't know, InOcean is a huge agency in LA that does all of the Hyundai work.

2:27Damien Le Castrec: So very cool. And Mark Pardee is Head of Brand Strategy for 72 and Sunny in LA. So those three will be up and they will be pitching the work. And then I'm going to be joined by System 1 and Tracksuit and the creative director out of Chiat Day, whose name escapes me right now, I think it's Natalie Dolls. I think I've got that right. If I got it wrong, Natalie, I'm apologizing. And she's terrific. And she's going to be joining me as sort of a co-host slash co-judge around the table. System One shares how the campaign's tested and we all sort of debate the reality of that compared to what we think it could have and should have tested at.

3:10Damien Le Castrec: And TrackSuit is there to talk to you about how the brands tracked. So you can use those different factors in determining what you think about the actual campaign that should be the winner. So really excited about it. You can get tickets on our website at onstrategyshowcase.com backslash live tour. It's onstrategyshowcase.com backslash live tour. And we hope to see you there. And by the way, we've made it affordable this year because we know things are tough in the industry. So for those of you who have been to our shows in LA in the past, we've dropped the price because we want to be able to do something for everybody that allows everybody to easily come to the show.

3:49Damien Le Castrec: So please go ahead and check that out. Okay, back to today's episode. I'm excited to have Damian Lacastric join me. I've been a fan of his for many years. As I talked about in the original recording with him, I tried to get him on the show when he was at Droga, and we were never able to connect. He has worked with Shelley Smaller for years. They have worked together as a team, which is really brilliant. And I think it's part of what makes a career great is when you can find a kindred spirit. It's like a marriage. If you can find a kindred spirit in a creative person and you do brilliant, you do your best work together, there is nothing like it, nothing that beats it.

4:32Damien Le Castrec: So I was thrilled when this new work came from Heineken. I'm not Heineken, from Beef Eater 0.0. And it just happened to be something that they're both working on at Lucky Generals. Now, Lucky Generals is a great shop out of London. It has been around for many years and has done some of the best work. And I think that what's interesting is that we see a lot of that great work here in the U.S., but we don't know that it's actually coming from Lucky Generals out of London. Even though they have a New York office now, they're building it up strongly. It's maybe not one of the better known agencies in North America, but it is certainly doing some of the great work that comes out of here.

5:12Damien Le Castrec: Now, for those people who may be clutching their pearls as they listen to this episode, I want to remind you that in the UK, the drinking age is 18. So when we talk about a target that's 18 plus, we are not trying to sell product alcohol to underaged individuals. It is 18 in the UK, as it is in Ireland, to actually drink legally. Also important to realize that this is actually a campaign for Beef Eater 0.0, so non-alcoholic. So in my conversation here, I was trying to dig into the sort of the master brand challenges that are out there for Beef Eater as a brand, because it's been around for decades.

5:52Damien Le Castrec: It's been around longer than I've been around. and we weren't really able to get into that because that was not the scope of Lucky General's work. They were doing an assignment for 0.0. So we had to narrow the definition of the conversation around that so you'll notice that happening. This is also a campaign that was not just for the UK. It's an international campaign, so it had to be able to work well in international markets. So with that said, let's roll on this one. This is Damian Lekastrik is Chief Strategy Officer of Lucky Generals in London, and Shelley Smaller is Chief Creative Officer of Lucky Generals in Joy.

6:36Damien Le Castrec: What's really interesting to me about you guys, which is one of the things that fascinates me about teams in the industry, and I see it, I seem to see it more often than not. great work comes from a great relationship between two people or three people or four people. It's a connection that you guys, Shelley, seem to have. You guys have worked together at a number of agencies. You've moved together to other agencies. Why, Shelley? Why do you guys do that?

7:10Shelley Smoler: I ask myself the same thing daily, actually. No, it's just, I think it's crucial. We both are firm believers that the best work comes from that. I mean, I hate the word collaboration because it gets thrown around all the time very loosely. But it is, it's when strategy and creative work hand in hand and not in silos. because I think basically the best creatives are actually very strategic and the best strategists are actually very creative. And it's when they both hold their ideas quite loosely and are open to the fact that it's quite malleable and can change through the process in order to answer the brief best.

7:58Shelley Smoler: I think that's when it works best.

8:01Damien Le Castrec: Did you sell yourselves as a team? Do you travel as a pack? Is that how you got, because you're moving to the same places together. Are you getting hired separately or are you getting hired as a team?

8:14Shelley Smoler: At first it was separate. At Droghid was separate. So we worked really well together at BBH. And then I went to Droghid first. And then a position became available for strategists. And Zamyar came in. And we carried on working together. and it was after I think we solidified our working relationship over so many years. It was evidenced through the work how it actually makes it so much better when there is that collaborative relationship. So I think for the next opportunity, we actively, I mean, I think what drew us to this place is that they know the importance of that and actually reached out to both of us knowing that we work well together already.

9:05Damien Le Castrec: It's kind of like Martin Beverly and Richard Brim, Damien. It's that sort of a great, I mean, when that happens, it's sort of career magic because when it doesn't happen, it can be the end of a career.

9:17Shelley Smoler: Very true. Yeah, and I think, you know, I didn't join this industry as a strategist just to end a strategy. and I think being able to have a great relationship with the people who take what we think is the right thing to do into tangible things. We make things with that thinking I think is what excites most planners of why we do strategy in this industry particularly and not in a consultancy or other places where we would be doing a different kind of strategy. I think the making things is important And I think it's always healthier for strat to spend more time with creatives than among strats.

10:02Shelley Smoler: And no disrespect to the strategy community. But we sometimes have the tendency to make things simple sounds very clever and inaccessible. And I think creatives help us keep ourselves real and simple and plain language. And it's not enough to sound nice and smart. They've got to make things with what we say. And I think the practical side of how we think is critical as a stress. I think that's why I love working with Shili because when I come up with something too shitty and she thinks it's bullshit, she will tell me in five seconds. As opposed to sitting at my desk and writing 60 slides of why this nonsense is great, I will stop very quickly and look again at the thing and come up with something better, easier to understand and to do something with.

10:50Shelley Smoler: So I guess that's why I wanted to do strategy in this industry, to make things and to be connecting thinking with makers and helping them to make things.

11:00Damien Le Castrec: I've always felt that great strategists are frustrated creatives. They sort of...

11:06Shelley Smoler: That's true.

11:07Damien Le Castrec: Yeah, it's tough, I think, sometimes. And I think for me, I'm that way because I always thought in ideas. and so for me it was the expression of a direction in an idea is what i tried to propagate and it gets you in trouble sometimes if you don't have a great creative partner who kind of plays that way and and that's the challenge it's like if you if you if you just stay on one side of the line that's i don't think you do sort of fulfill your potential to be able to play in both and that's what it's most fun we've had hendrix uh jen on the show in the past and had a conversation about how they were introducing the brand and promoting the brand.

11:52Damien Le Castrec: How do you think of the category? Is it a category you think where the brands have very clear identities? How do you think about them?

12:03Shelley Smoler: I think I can talk about the category in relationship to Bifita. And I think the thing that sets Bifita apart It's the fact that, yes, it's called the London dry gin, but it's the last major one that is still distilled in London. All the other ones are kind of, you know, following the methodology of London dry gin, but they are not made in the city of London. And I think there's someone one day when we were at a pub talking about gin with people in the real life. and someone said, I picked Bifita because it's exactly what gin should taste like. And if you look at the category, there is a lot of gin browns trying to be something else than a gin brown.

12:54Shelley Smoler: And you've got, you know, those wonderful quirky words, Alihendrix, you have Gordons that are trying to be leaning really into the Britishness, etc. You've got the Tanqueray that's kind of more the New York side of things. And Bifita felt like the real authentic Londoner gin. And it felt like there is something about it that felt unique. And its story is a proof of how unique it is because it's still in the heart of London.

13:24Damien Le Castrec: So Shelley, what do you think, what is the advantage of being of London for this brand?

13:32Shelley Smoler: Well, I think it's a point of differentiation and it gave us an opportunity to be able to guide the work into a very specific niche space that we can own. Because I think it's hard in the category to find a point of difference to make stuff not generic. So I think that was a great starting point because it focused our thinking and narrowed it from the start because we had to come up with an idea that did feel very London at the heart of it.

14:09Damien Le Castrec: When you talk about Beefeater, what's the greatest challenge you think it faces on and off premise as a brand?

14:18Shelley Smoler: I mean, Beefeater, like all Gene Browns at the moment, you know, Gene globally is kind of slowing down in terms of growth. There is a lot of, you know, changing behavior in terms of what people drink and when they drink it, etc. And I think the core challenge is how do we stay relevant and aspirational to drinkers and younger ones particularly. And I think more specific to Bifita, the main strength of Bifita is what sets it apart, which is its connection to London. But it's also the greatest challenge is how do you make London something that people who are not in London will care about? And I think that's always the kind of challenge.

14:58Damien Le Castrec: Or people who are in London care about.

14:59Shelley Smoler: yeah exactly well it's always a challenge with provenance story and i think you don't want to be falling to the postcard trap of you know just depicting an amazing city with good-looking people holding a drink and you're like yeah well what's in it for me so i think that's kind of the challenge is how do you use what set us apart on this kind of truth about the fact that we are the london gin into something that you know resonate elsewhere and excite people i have this i'm not a

15:27Damien Le Castrec: gin drinker. For those of you not watching on YouTube, I'm actually holding the Beef Eater bottle. I have this because my father-in-law drinks a Beef Eater martini. That's his drink. So we have to have this for when he comes. And as you can see, he hasn't come a lot because the

15:45Shelley Smoler: bottle actually hasn't even been opened.

15:48Damien Le Castrec: It's been a while. But there is this amazing iconography, and talk about distinctive brand assets. I mean, this King's Guard character, the rad, the city of London, the statement London on it. I mean, this is something that's been around for, you know, is longer than I've been around. I mean, this is something that has got generational awareness, I would think. Does it struggle with the younger audience with that 18 to 34?

16:17Shelley Smoler: I think, yeah. I mean, it's been on the bottle for as long as we can remember. and I think there is definitely a challenge of like breathing new meaning into it and not trying to embrace it and make it something that we don't shy away from and trying to play with it in a way that it means more than just being something on the bottle. Yeah, I think it's capitalizing on that asset because it lost a little bit of modernity, I think, and meaning. it's just there but I don't know if we've capitalized enough of it so that was one of the challenges for us as well is how do we make more of it and bring it in

17:00Damien Le Castrec: so let's talk about 0.0 it's Beefeater 0.0 what's the client ask for you guys Shelly, what is it that you had to achieve or do

17:13Shelley Smoler: not a big deal really, just make it famous in culture

17:17Damien Le Castrec: oh okay shit, that's easy

17:18Shelley Smoler: Yeah, no, it's a simple task really. No, but they really just wanted us to win among 18 to 34-year-olds and people who moderate during social occasions. And as we know, this market is drinking a little bit less. They call it zebra striping. it's something that they do you know to to get more out of their nights and out of life and the next day um so it was how do we how do we appeal to that segment of the market in a way that is relevant to them and interesting and pr-able um was the challenge one of the things that struck

18:07Damien Le Castrec: me when i was reading through what you guys sent me who's the target for beef feeder 0.0 is it the beef eater gin drinker is it somebody else?

18:20Shelley Smoler: So it's definitely mostly non-beef eater drinkers in markets where the product have been available to date you would have 75 % of beef eater zero zero drinkers who are new to brand.

18:35Damien Le Castrec: Holy shit.

18:37Shelley Smoler: Yeah and to Shilly's point those people will be you know 18, 34 and you usually will pick non-alcoholic alcohol spirit in social occasions so they will alternate a full fat with a non-alcoholic drink within the same evening or one evening they will go full non-alcoholic drink etc so that was kind of the people and the behavior we're trying to win over is the people that alternate between spirit and non-spirit but yeah the zero zero is a big bet to bring more people into the brand, really.

19:16Damien Le Castrec: And so they're not, so with Tanqueray or others, they're not, they don't offer a zero. I thought Tanqueray had a 0.0. Yeah, they do, they do, they do. They do, okay. So are they, they're gin drinkers that are coming into the brand or are they coming into the category?

19:33Shelley Smoler: So not necessarily gin drinkers. They are like people that will have non-alcoholic spirits and yeah, they will try the 0-0 as a first experience of Bifita. The thing is, people's repertoire when it comes to non-alcohol spirits are still fragile because they are very new. And there is a lot of trying the new things in town type of thing and give it a go until you stay with it. So that's what we realized when we talked to consumer. It's not quite established yet as the key players out there and set in stone and you can't challenge them. I think everyone's trying to compete to get those people over and to become their drink of choice when it comes to having a zero-zero.

20:20Damien Le Castrec: So 75 % of the 0.0 drinkers are non-category, non-Beefeater.

20:27Shelley Smoler: Yeah, new to Beefeater, yeah. Well, that's what they've seen in the markets with the products available, yeah.

20:34Damien Le Castrec: And do they convert, do you know, to gin drinkers?

20:38Shelley Smoler: Again, like 15 % of people who have tried 00 will go on to the main one afterwards. Again, this is a very new product. We're talking like a few markets that had the product available on shelves and at the bar. These are the kind of the behavior that Pernodiki have started to notice.

21:05Damien Le Castrec: Yeah, yeah. So let's talk about where you went strategically. And then we'll turn and start talking about where you went executionally. But what did you consider strategically? Did you have a couple of things in your head? And what were those alternatives? I always love it when planners share that.

21:21Shelley Smoler: Yeah, I mean, we quite quickly landed on something when we looked at the category and compared to what we were hearing from consumers who are the kind of consumer who will alternate between non-alcohol alcohol spirits. And it felt like they were a bit of a mismatch. The category was trying to be kind of a bit defensive and rational of trying to make people feel the zero-person version. Don't worry, it's as good as the main one. It's as good, the same taste, you'll have the same kind of fun. And by the way, you might have fewer calories as well. So it always felt like it was sold to people like the second best.

22:09Shelley Smoler: And it felt a bit, you know, super rational, super defensive, not quite the aspirational kind of communication this category and industry has been famous for, right? and when we talked to people who were like really you know already zebra striping and you know having a bit of zero zero amongst other things it didn't feel like they there were people who were doing that with clear intention to milk as much as they can of the social occasions so they would go out and stay longer they would go out on a Monday and Tuesday oh and shit someone called me on Wednesday for another drink and they will be moderating so they can do more the next day so you know it was kind of an interesting contrast of you've got a category trying to make sure that zero zero doesn't come across as a lesser drink and you've got people in market going for those options to just have more out of a night out on the next day and etc so that very early when we compare you know when we spend time talking to consumer that's kind of the the thing that we spotted very early on and we said wait that's that's that's interesting and we've got to capitalize on that particularly when you look at literally the lens of we are beef eater with a brand from london and you know london is a city where there is a lot going on and you kind of have to have the moderation thing in your arsenal to keep up with the city and do as much as you possibly can so they were a nice kind of bring it back to us and london and the master brown and we kind of doubled down on that and that's kind of like got us quite quickly to what we need to say i think where we had more options is more about how do we want to say it yeah yeah

24:04Damien Le Castrec: I got to say, I love, though, the executions from Heineken for Heineken Zero, where the guy gets stopped by the cops and he's drinking a beer. That shit's great. I mean, other brands have executed that same humor-routed sort of strategy over here, which is really great. So there is a couple of really interesting things happening. And I think some stuff from Guinness has been pretty good. But so what comes to you, Shelley? I mean, I know you guys are sort of connected at the hip throughout the process, but what's striking you early on? And so what had your mind sort of turning?

24:42Shelley Smoler: Well, we were discussing a lot about the idea of, you know, how do you make sure people realize that you don't, that you actually get more rather than less from drinking zero. That was the crux of it. And like Zamiya says, we had different ways of articulating it. At one stage, it was Miss Nothing. And then, you know, we were toying with different lines. But when we thought about it, we were like, how do you show a person getting more? And we didn't want to have like an obvious ambassador for moderation. Because when you think about it, it's actually the people that probably get most from moderation are those that indulged in excess in the past and probably got less as a result of that.

25:34Shelley Smoler: And only those that are keeping up today after so many years of excess are ones that are more into moderation. So it's not people you'd ordinarily associate with moderation, but we were thinking someone who is a rock star and still going probably can see the benefits of moderation having had excess in the past. So we were trying to think of characters like that that could create the talkability and fame, still bring to life the connection to London. So someone who has that connection to London, someone who's had a past of excess who you wouldn't immediately associate with moderation. And we had a few on the table, But that's how we came up with JK as a potential person to do something with, to collaborate with.

26:31Shelley Smoler: And then the more we looked into that, the more we realized there's something really interesting there, particularly with his background of X's. He's had, you know, many known kind of run-ins with the paparazzi and then a bit of a checkered past when it comes to that. So we thought he'd actually be the perfect ambassador because he's still going strong. He's got such a huge fan base. Yeah, I was curious about that.

27:00Damien Le Castrec: So is he universally known? Because this song, him as an artist, I mean, some of his most famous stuff is 30 years old now. So is he universally known?

27:10Shelley Smoler: So, I mean, to be honest, we had an assumption that research proved we were wrong about. Because we thought, like, you know, as people of our age, we thought that people of our age would be probably the heartland of Jamiroquai. And it's probably true. But when we took the name, you know, his face and some of the elements, you know, across the key markets, like, you know, from Brazil, Italy, Spain, Czech Republic, You know, I think as an average, I think you had 60 % people who had recognition of that guy amongst the 18 to 34 years old. And then you look back and then we did some digging on TikTok and stuff.

27:49Shelley Smoler: And that's when we discovered a corner of Internet culture where people were taking that 30 year old video and playing with it and creating all sorts of memes about what the hell is he reaching towards and reaching for. So, you know, it was quite interesting. Like we had a lot of names we tested. and you know before we dig deep into the individual kind of celeb stuff we wanted an expected phase for for a moderation story and a london connection etc you know we didn't expect jk to do so well um with younger demographics and with people that are not necessarily you know from from europe or in london and to our surprise you know he did come across as a as a top contender especially when you associate him with his music video virtual insanity which you know people recognize.

28:36Shelley Smoler: Yeah, so that gave us the perfect jumping off point for virtual insanity.

29:03Shelley Smoler: Yeah, but we actually, we did a bit of creative first before we approached him with the idea to unlock what would be a really interesting angle into this. And then we approached him with the actual idea.

29:17Damien Le Castrec: Does it come to you right away that we'll sort of recreate virtual insanity? Or were there thoughts of, well, we'll just use JK, and we don't know exactly how we'll use him, but he's a good guy for this?

29:33Shelley Smoler: well actually i mean so we knew jk was a good guy for this but then we came up with hundreds of ideas of how we could use him and actually this was an amalgamation of more than one idea our initial idea was he's known for wearing hats um you know everyone who knows jk associates him with different hats and if we're talking about doing more does it not make sense that he wears so many different hats. But the more research we did into the idea of wearing all these hats and the more research we did into virtual insanity and saw that it was the 30th anniversary of virtual insanity, that there were all these memes about him reaching out, you know, that famous reach.

30:18Shelley Smoler: Everyone was like, what is he reaching out for? What was he grabbing? So we had a bunch of different ingredients that we were liking and we tried to put them all together to come up with a piece that incorporated all those different interesting nuggets into one idea so we thought okay we like the idea that he wears more hats and it makes perfect sense with the music video because he was stuck in this little room like yeah the walls moved but it was still one room so what if we opened up that room and just expanded it into more worlds, all these different worlds where he can make use of all these different hats and express himself more and do more things.

31:04Shelley Smoler: And all of these scenarios, all of these rooms were based on things that he does in his personal life and that moderation has helped unlock for him. So it all comes from real little insights and real nuggets and real behavior on social culture and all of that, which came to life in this idea. But it all started from how do we show that, you know, JK gets more than he has before. That was the crux of the idea. And then these were just different ways of expressing that and bringing it to life. We spent a lot of time studying how do we best launch this thing. As we said, there is like a lot, there is a, 30 years later there's still people talking about jk and this music video and people playing with the meme etc so the way we launched it is like we went onto those reddit threads and discord there is a big jammy require community on discord would you believe wow and what we did is like we wanted to set a few fires in those places to you know hopefully get one to catch and get people to be like what the hell is about to happen so we did like some stolen footage of the actual shoot with like stolen cctv footage where you see jk a bit older than the original but still looking good walking on set and be like what the hell's going on and we just seeded that in some of the places online and people were starting to wonder like what's going on what is he up to what is he up to what is he up to then after there were the actual you know music video launch that we did like a music video launch with like different you know papers and journalists from different cultural publication with jk in person answering the question etc to make sure that you know got pr picking up a bit and then we launched the actual music video which is surprising right because it's a two minute plus piece of content and the you know the the engagement has perhaps beaten any kind of industry benchmark that would always force you to do only a six second ad because that's only you know that's about how much time people have you know like people do engage with the actual long form in ways we probably didn't expect even still the footage from the beefed page and put it on their own thing etc so the music video is obviously a big part of it but we've got also creators that we've involved to that will come in the the next few weeks i'm sure we can talk about it but you know getting them to recreate the famous slide to engage their own community with it.

33:37Damien Le Castrec: We are in talk

33:38Shelley Smoler: to develop some elements of interactive things that we can build on the same kind of idea, but I'm not going to reveal too much on that. In terms of other assets, we did also so far, it's two weeks since the campaign launched, we have done zero paid media. And I think from what we can track, we've got 50 million views on the main asset, and we are getting to 5 million of the behind-the-scenes content. But we've also done 15 second cut downs of that music video where it gets to the bottle quicker you get to the message quicker we've developed a series of content where JK in person teach you how to make cocktails with his hat and all of that he reveals a secret ingredient under each hat and with that secret ingredient he makes a cocktail so there are lots of different cocktails where he creates the cocktails we also made to a lot of the influencers and the journalist boxes where they got their own Jumaricoie hat and the BFU bottle with the Jumaricoie logo silhouette on the front of it.

34:48Damien Le Castrec: That's great.

34:49Shelley Smoler: Including the vinyl, so lots in design. But there's also more exciting stuff that we can't reveal yet that is to come.

34:57Damien Le Castrec: One of the big questions is because this is such an iconic video and I mean I can't get it out of my head for the last week. How do you make sure that this doesn't just become a JK spot? How do you make sure the brand's getting credit?

35:15Shelley Smoler: So I think, well the first thing is the message. We're telling a story with that, we call it a remake. You know, we are expanding something famous where we contribute and bring our own message, which is this ability to do more stuff. Then more in the execution, if you look at the two-minute film, the first 15 seconds are the most critical point to integrate the brown. And also, it just fits perfectly and it feels the most natural, which is we start on the frame of the shot that everyone knows, where he's sliding toward the camera and he picks up the bottle. All of that happens the first 15 seconds.

35:58Shelley Smoler: You know, it's literally the most important moment where you've got the brown in. And it's not just like sticking the logo in people's face. It's literally integrating it in the storyline of that music video. You know, you've got a lot of cut down 15 seconds that hit you harder with the bottle, with the Beefeater and with the message. And I think it's also important that the brand itself, you know, in reaching for that glass of Beefeater, became the catalyst for everything that came after that. because it was because of that, that it unlocked the other rooms. So although the branding might be subtler in other places, to not piss off those people, it is integral to the story.

36:39Damien Le Castrec: When I was watching the original video, I had the same question probably everybody did. This is back in the day. How did they do it, right? Because the answer that everybody's curious about is the floor is not moving.

36:52Shelley Smoler: the physical structure is moving yes what the hell was your set like were you want like a

36:58Damien Le Castrec: soccer field size set to be able to move around so many multiple rooms well it was so hard because

37:05Shelley Smoler: in this one what we did is so yeah in the original it was the walls that moved and in ours it was the floor that moved um but and and a few walls like one or two walls but mostly it was the floor so that we could get through the nine different rooms um but even then you would need such a massive studio there's no ways you could have that kind of space so we had to build it in parts and and you'd go through the rooms and then quickly the set would have to be redressed so you could go through the rooms again in real time or you this is how you edited it each one was its one take shot so you couldn't actually that was another reason to add to my whole heart palpitations was the fact that you know the takes had to be perfect it's not like you could edit this thing together and you know this is like adolescence it had to be done right yeah exactly so i mean we really didn't make life easy for ourselves by wanting to do it for real but um i think that's what people have really appreciated you know is that the craft of this was so important to us um you know as a homage not only to the first one but to jk himself who pays so much attention to craft and it was such a relief when even at the press um conference he was like i think it's better than the first one i was like thank you god um but uh no it was really i think it was important for us all to do it justice and to pay the same level of craft and human ingenuity that went into the first one to make this one good.

38:53Damien Le Castrec: So, I mean, for me, Lucky Generals is just one of the best shops in the world. And from some, I think we've had maybe three or four episodes with Lucky Generals clients on here. So it's brilliant to have you guys back on and to see how you're continuing the amazing charge. But it's great, great work. So well done. Really great.

39:16Shelley Smoler: Oh, thank you so much. Thanks, Fergus.

39:19Damien Le Castrec: All right, it's Damian LeCastrec is Chief Strategy Officer at Lucky Generals in London and Shelley Smaller is Chief Creative Officer at Lucky Generals. Thank you both for sharing your time and hopefully we'll see you next time we're in London.

39:33Shelley Smoler: Yeah, we'd love that. Thank you so much. I guess. Yeah. Looking forward to meeting you in real life.

39:39Damien Le Castrec: And we'll see everybody on the next episode.