The archive · Advertising · Marketing decision · 2004–2005
Honda's 'Grrr' sells diesel with a song about hate — Cannes Grand Prix 2005
Honda launches its new i-CTDi diesel with an animated song about hating dirty engines enough to change them — Cannes Film Grand Prix.
Honda (Honda UK) · Wieden+Kennedy London
What it had to solve
Honda UK needed to launch its first i-CTDi diesel engines to a market that saw diesels as noisy, dirty and slow — and to get Honda onto buyers' shortlists.
How it works
In 2004 Honda UK launched its first i-CTDi diesel engines into a market that associated diesels with noise, dirt and poor performance. Wieden+Kennedy London answered with 'Grrr', a 90-second animated film in which cute animals attack clunky, soot-belching engines across a colorful fantasyland, until a pristine new Honda diesel appears — all set to a song by radio host Garrison Keillor about how hating something can inspire you to change it for the better.
The film dramatized a real motivation: Honda's chief engineer hated diesel cars and pledged to fix them. That insight became the campaign idea 'Hate Something, Change Something,' executed not just as the cinema spot but across TV, print, radio, interactive TV and the internet as one integrated effort.
The craft paid off critically and commercially. 'Grrr' won the Film Grand Prix at Cannes 2005 with a strong majority of jury votes — making up for Honda's 'Cog' missing the prize two years earlier — plus a Titanium Lion for the integrated campaign. Honda reported a 43% rise in visits to its website and a 62% increase in spontaneous brand awareness, and the spot also won the Grand Clio, top honors at the One Show and the Andys.
Why it lands
- It gave an invisible technology a story: instead of listing diesel benefits, the campaign sold the emotional logic of hating something enough to change it.
- The music and animation did the persuasion — Keillor's song made a technical launch feel like entertainment, which is why juries and viewers remembered it.
- One idea scaled across every medium, from cinema to interactive TV, so the campaign itself demonstrated the integrated thinking it claimed.
- It treated the product's weakness (diesel's bad reputation) as the raw material of the creative, turning prejudice into the argument.
What it did
The campaign won the 2005 Cannes Film Grand Prix with 17 of 22 jury votes, plus a Titanium Lion for the integrated effort, and also took the Grand Clio and top prizes at the One Show and the Andys. Honda reported website visits up 43% and spontaneous brand awareness up 62%, and AdweekMedia later named it Commercial of the Decade (non-Super Bowl).
What you can take
Give an unglamorous product a point of view: turning diesel's bad reputation into an argument about changing what you hate made an engine launch feel like a philosophy — and craft made it contagious.
Since then
'Grrr' became the most-decorated Honda work of its era and a benchmark for W+K London's Honda relationship, which produced 'Cog' in 2003 and 'Hands' in 2013. AdweekMedia's Best of the 2000s list picked it as Commercial of the Decade (non-Super Bowl) in December 2009, and it is still cited as an example of making an unglamorous product a cultural object.
Sources
- 'Grrr' takes Cannes Grand Prix for Wieden & Kennedy
- Honda's 'Grrr' Takes Grand TV Clio
- Honda Wins Commercial of the Decade
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