The average American watches five hours of television per day—76 days worth of programming per year. As Peak TV rises, that means more days spent with complex, cinematic shows. Shows that, despite their high production value, most people watch on a smartphone, laptop or budget-range TV.
Then, there are the people FCB New York calls serious watchers: fans who clock at least ten episodes a week via multiple sources and want to shell out for a premium viewing experience. If binge-watching were an Olympic sport, these fans would be the top-seeded athletes, and in a new spot released this week, FCB rewarded one such fan, Tish, with an unusual home delivery: an LG OLED TV, brought into her living room by Gaten Matarazzo and Noah Schnapp of Netflix’s smash hit "Stranger Things."
"So much advertising talks about how great a TV is, but not what it’s in service of," said Ari Halper, chief creative officer at FCB New York. "We wanted to fuse people’s love of what they watch to the TV itself, to honor and reward the serious watcher for watching the right way."
In the spot, Tish buys the TV from an actor posing as an electronics store worker; the next day, it shows up in the hands of two characters from her favorite show, who ask Tish to heat up some Eggo waffles (a nod to the show) while they set up the screen themselves.
It’s the second installment of "Serious Deliveries," part of a larger campaign called "Serious Watchers." (The first spot, released in June, followed "Orange is the New Black" star Yael Stone as she delivered the same LG to OINTB mega-fan Chris.) The execution is a way to signal that the evolution of streaming means brands need to evolve how they think of their customers and how to connect with the most dedicated viewers, said Halper. "We’re carving out a division, that this TV is for those who want to take their TV watching seriously and do it the right way."
Like any campaign featuring real people, this one has been unpredictable. Tish’s reaction to the surprise was a delighted scream, whereas Chris was confused and a little unsettled. "We’re relying on what people bring, how they rise to the occasion when their favorite show arrives in their home," Halper said. "What we thought was fresh was the characters, not necessarily the actors, thanking you—the blurring of the TV world to the real world."
It’s not a coincidence that the blurring happened with Netflix shows, said Halper. "Let’s face it, they’re crushing it—they’re at the forefront of changing how we watch." Binge-watching exists because of Netflix, and the combination of that behavior with content worth putting on an $1800 TV is what elevates the status of a watcher to serious. "We wanted to align ourselves with who we felt embodied that new breed."
The campaign will soon expand past just Netflix shows, or even just content providers, exploring more ways to connect with and valorize serious watchers. "We’ll be turning the camera around to celebrate the viewer and all the idosyncratic behaviors that pop up around this new way of watching," Halper said. "That’s where we’re going to get into some more insightful, conceptual, interesting executions."