Honda returned to the FIM Superbike World Championship this year with a new Castrol Honda team, with team riders British born Jonathan Rea (currently sixth in the WSB 2011 standings) and the Barcelona born Ruben Xaus (16th).
The Castrol Honda team are racing on Honda’s CBR1000RR Fireblades, and managed by the Dutch-based Ten Kate Racing.
While Honda provide the bikes and use sponsorship deals in World Superbike racing they are known for their own sponsorship deals in both sport and media. Viewers of Channel 4 may be aware of their on-going sponsorship deal with Channel 4 documentaries which began in 2010 with the now familiar strapline ‘Documentaries on 4, sponsored by Honda’.
They have recently renewed the sponsorship contract and commissioned four new mini-documentary films.
Each film will be shown during Channel 4 television documentaries such as Cutting Edge. The films do not use professional actors but instead focus on telling a story of real-life Honda customers and how they use their Honda vehicles in very special ways. The first of four films tells how Philippa, an alpaca farmer uses her Honda ATV on her Oxfordshire farm.
Martin Moll, Head of Marketing at Honda (UK) said, ‘”I am very excited that our continued relationship sponsoring Channel 4 documentaries allows us to focus on our customers, highlighting their warm – sometimes quirky – personal experiences of Honda products either for fun or as a necessary part of their daily livelihood. We hope that this campaign will unveil further examples from our customers, one of which will be nominated to be brought to life on TV for a final set of idents later on in the year”.
Chris Groom and Sam Heath, Creative Directors at Wieden + Kennedy (W+K) who created the films said, “We knew there were all sorts of people using all sorts of Honda products in extraordinary ways. A documentary format provided the perfect platform to celebrate them.”
To accompany the new Channel 4 campaign, Honda are using Facebook and Twitter and an online hub www.honda.co.uk/stories where the videos will be available in full along with articles and other interesting stories. There is also a competition in the ‘Take Part’ section of the website, where Honda owners can upload their own amusing and interesting stories explaining how they use their own Honda. The films’ creators, W+K will select their favourite story and make it into the final mini-documentary to be shown later in the year as part of the Channel 4 campaign.
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