Zeniya Honten: pawned items wait for owners as loyal characters — ADFEST 2012 Best

Zeniya Honten, a Nagasaki-based pawnbroker founded over 60 years earlier, noticed that young people had come to see pawnshops the way discount stores advertise themselves: 'we buy high, we sell cheap'. The real service — borrowing money against an item you intend to reclaim — was invisible, so the company's third-generation president set out to explain it.

Its agency partners Dentsu Kyushu and T&E built a film series that swaps people and objects: a pawned sword appears as a samurai, a camera as an old gentleman, a kimono as a lady, and a guitar as a rocker. Seated on shelves arranged like a theatre stage, they wait for their owners, insisting they will come back — 'a samurai trusts his lord' — until the closing spot has the youngest character finally tell his own story.

Planner Masahiko Katsuura said the aim was to portray the Japanese instinct to trust and care for others. The warehouse was filmed in a Fukuoka theatre, the director Koichiro Kishi and the cast all had stage backgrounds, and about 200 performers were auditioned in Tokyo and Fukuoka.

The series took the top Film Lotus prize at ADFEST 2012 in Pattaya, where the jury praised winners for connecting with audiences emotionally. Back home, store footfall rose and younger visitors started mentioning the commercials at the counter.