Nice going Melvin!

This commercial was made in 1983 just after a huge renovation took place at the Detroit Zoo. Its purpose was to create excitement and boost attendance. With this commercial they hoped to penetrate markets of the suburbs and surrounding areas. It worked the Zoo became one of Detroit’s crown jewels bringing visitors from all over Michigan and surrounding states. This promotion worked so well it was used all over the country to promote other Zoo’s. This commercial was produced by WB Doner & company and won multiple CLIO awards for the best TV spot in 1983. Wikipedia’s definition of The Clio Awards “ are the world's most recognizable international advertising awards, presented annually to reward innovation and creative excellence in advertising, design and communication. The categories include work in nearly all types of media, and the judges are advertising professionals from around the world.” Not only did it put Detroit and the zoo into the spotlight by winning multiple CLIO’s, it contributed to a long and lucrative reputation for Donor that still exists today. This spot was great for creating admiration for all the animals by giving them human traits. Everyone could relate to one or more of these characters. By adding voices to the everyday actions of the animals, as they prepared for the zoo opening, it gave the target market a pleasant and funny memory, and created a desire to go and “Meet” the animals. This promotion also created nostalgia. I know when growing up I repeatedly heard some of the lines from this commercial from friends. “Nice Going Melvin!” when someone pulled a “Melvin”. So the script stuck in peoples’ minds re-creating the commercial and created reminder advertising through word of mouth. We talked about using celebrities to promote a product. There were impersonated voices of Bing Crosby, and Jimmy Durante, and a few others. Again it created Nostalgia for the older crowd. If you grew up in Michigan in and around Detroit during the 80’s you have memories not only of your visits to the zoo, but also of this memorable commercial of the “Talking Animals”.