Independent Melbourne production house The Woolshed Company today came forward as the creators of a new video produced in collaboration with Hawthorn Football Club which has gone viral on social media.

The video, titled ‘hawk drop snake of family bbq. lol’, has been revealed as a marketing stunt to help the AFL team to launch its 2016 finals campaign ‘Embrace The Hunt’.

With five million views, 90,000 shares and 115,000 likes so far, the video features a hawk snatching up a wild snake and dropping it on an unsuspecting family BBQ in Melbourne.

Following a global media debate over the video’s authenticity in online publications including The Age, The Daily Mail, The Huffington Post and numerous local and international TV news networks, Hawthorn and The Woolshed today came forward and claimed the viral sensation.

In a cheeky move, a sticker from rival AFL club Geelong featured on the esky of the unsuspecting family in the video – a subtle pointer to next Friday’s qualifying final between Hawthorn and Geelong.

The announcement follows The Woolshed’s ‘Viral Experiment’ in July, where the young production house revealed it had created eight of the world’s most viral videos over the previous two years. Those videos scored around 215 million views globally.

The Woolshed’s co-founder and MD, Dave Christison, said Hawthorn approached The Woolshed after learning of The Viral Experiment, briefing them to create an innovative marketing stunt for the club as it heads into 2016 finals season.

“It was exciting and humbling working with Hawthorn. They rolled the dice on something brave and unconventional, and it’s paid off. The project turnaround was extremely tight, taking only two weeks,” he said.

“Hawthorn were incredibly trusting and collaborative, giving us full creative freedom but also being hands on to help during production.

“It was also a great opportunity for us to deploy the insights we’d gathered during our two-year Viral Experiment. We learned a lot about creating short-form, snackable narratives in that time, and having the chance to prove how powerful these can be for a brand has been hugely rewarding.”