Kabikiller hires a sloth as the Laziest Influencer and reaches ~30% market share

Japan's mould-remover category was stagnant, and rival launches leaned on celebrities or cleaning experts saying the usual things. S.C. Johnson was bringing out Kabikiller Easy Continuous Jet, a mould cleaner designed to cut bathroom-tile cleaning time in half, and asked VML & Ogilvy Japan how to launch it in a way that would genuinely surprise consumers.

The agency's answer was a character, not a claim: Mr. Easy, an original CG sloth introduced as the Laziest Influencer. Because the product removes work from cleaning, the mascot embodied the benefit by doing as little as possible. He was late to the product launch press event because he overslept, and he fell asleep during an Instagram Live; his social posts carried deadpan lines such as 'Lift a finger? Sure, if I had any.'

The laziness rule applied at every touchpoint — film, TV, radio and social — so Mr. Easy behaved as a consistent influencer rather than a mascot who only appeared in commercials. The creative director told trade press that consumers are tired of one-way messages in TV ads, and that a character who never tells anyone to buy the product connects by embodying the end benefit himself.

The campaign gave the stagnant category a distinct tone, and the Kabikiller brand reached approximately 30% market share after the new product launched. Trade coverage in Asia treated the sloth as proof that an opposite-to-category idea could carry a mundane household product.