Built In Australia, By Century Batteries, Resonates With Local Consumers

Battery manufacturer Century Batteries has again turned to celebrating all things Australian with a new TV campaign as it moves closer to becoming the first manufacturer in this country to achieve a century in business.

While the creative for “Built for Australia…In Australia” was signed off in early 2020, long before anyone would envisage a world caught up by the COVID-19 pandemic, its ethos has already been embraced by businesses and consumers.

Marketing manager (Australasia) Andrew Bottoms said demand for Australian-made batteries surged as supply chains were interrupted, industries were looking for homegrown products they may have previously sourced overseas.

Bottoms said the COVID pandemic strengthening the need for a significant commitment to local manufacturing.

“From May to August 2020 we saw a 15 per cent increase in the sale of Australian made batteries over the same period last year,” he said.

“As borders closed our retail partners reported a massive push for Aussie-made products, particularly for car batteries and then camping and leisure products as families looked to holiday and travel closer to home.”

In 2017, the company launched a TV campaign celebrating the brand as an Australian icon along with the call to keep local manufacturing alive: this was a return to television advertising after a 12-year hiatus. The 2020 campaign takes the iconic brand further embracing reliability and trust.

From workers with 4am starts to those tinkering on vintage cars, the campaign focuses on a series of relatable stories depicting how Australians rely on Century Batteries to power their life, business, hobbies and passions. Starring Century staffers and customers it will run across traditional and digital platforms throughout the current cricket season and further into 2021.

“There is no overclaiming with Century,” AusGarage Automotive advertising creative director James Payne said.

“There is a lot of pride by the workers for a product they believe in. With so much emotion around ‘mates looking after mates’ even before COVID, it was especially rewarding to tap into genuine Aussie stories to share the story of this Aussie-made product.

“We wanted to create something that stood out from the shouty, loud, hard sales ads: creating something that truly resonated with different audience categories and delivering a simple memorable message.

“The reality is this is a company that has and is standing the test of time and who was there for Australians when times were tough. If the COVID crisis has taught us one thing it is the importance of keeping jobs in Australia, as well as supporting businesses who are the engine room of the economy.”

The national television campaign, with both 30 second- and 15-seconds ads, will play out across Free-to-Air on Channel 7 and Network 10 along with print and social media. Century has just unveiled state of the art technology that will increase its capabilities to produce over 1.3 million batteries a year.

Credits for the campaign are as follows:

Agency: AusGarage

Client: Century Yuasa Batteries

Account lead: Bernard Raffaut

Director: James Payne

DP: Declan Sinclair

Sound/grip: Rohan Thomas

Sound design: David Butcherine

Stills: Anthony Hearsey.

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