Minions/The Office - Marketing Blog Post

While looking for an ad campaign to write about, one stood out to me among the rest and that’s the unlikely collaboration of the hit tv show “The Office” and the newly released Despicable Me prequel, “Minions: The Rise of Gru”. I was interested in this ad because I was a fan of The Office back when it was airing and I also enjoyed the first couple Despicable Me movies growing up. Both Despicable Me and The Office are comedies and would have a similar if not the same value proposition, something along the lines of “we’ll make you laugh so hard you cry”. While both are comedies, I think the fanbase of the two are pretty different. Despicable Me is a goofy movie about a supervillain and his army of little yellow alien things and The Office is an adult sitcom about a paper company. This is definitely remarkable.

The intention of the ad is to promote the new movie release as well as the “extended superfan” episodes of The Office on Peacock. The ad is the opening theme song of The Office but with minions instead of the Office cast. In my opinion the ad is humorous but seeing the cgi minions in a live action setting is a little strange. The attention to detail in the ad is great though, the more you watch the ad the more details and references you find.

Back in the glory days of The Office, the show did incredibly well to the point where it got so popular some people will roll their eyes if you bring it up because at this point they’re tired of hearing about it. While the show still retains its popularity, it ended back in 2013 and is sorta old news now but the theme song is iconic and easily recognizable and this ad campaign takes advantage of that. Upon discovering this collaboration I learned that Peacock (a streaming service which I personally have never heard of) has been releasing “extended superfan” episodes of The Office which is just the extended cut version of the original Office with new scenes and jokes. This new Office rerelease is the main focus of this ad.

The Despicable Me franchise has been periodically releasing new movies since 2010. Minions: The Rise of Gru is the fifth movie being released twelve years after the original Despicable Me. I enjoyed the first couple Despicable Me movies when I was a kid but as I grew up I kind of lost interest in the franchise. I feel this is probably a common problem children’s movie franchises run into, their fanbase growing up and losing interest. When I heard a fifth Despicable Me/Minions movie was being released I wasn’t necessarily excited, my reaction was more along the lines of, “they’re really still making more of those?”. Despite my opinion on the movie, it’s actually doing really well. It made $125 million over the Fourth of July weekend.

Something that makes this marketing approach unique is the combination of a children’s movie and an adult sitcom. I wouldn’t think there would be much overlap in the fanbase of this new movie and the office but I think that’s part of the reason they did it. Both are goofy comedies so someone who enjoyed The Office may also enjoy Minions: The Rise of Gru, they’re merging their fanbase in a way. While getting children interested in the office doesn’t make much sense it definitely makes sense to get the attention of the parents of these children. Most kids need their parents to drive them to the theater to watch this new movie. What better to motivate the parents to go see this movie with their kids than make a crossover ad with one of their favorite sitcoms. It’s sort of the same idea where kids' shows throw in some clever adult jokes to keep the parents entertained while they watch cartoons with their kids. It also works the other way around for people who were fans of The Office and also excited for the new Despicable Me movie. The new Minions movie is definitely getting more attention than the office extended cut so the office is piggybacking off the success of the minions to spread the word about the “extended superfan” Office episodes. “Hey, here’s a new movie that just came out! Oh by the way while we’ve got you here, remember that tv show you loved? We’re releasing new extended cut episodes!”

If I were the brand/project manager for this I would've made the entire video cgi to match the minions and maybe loose the rocket launcher clip, that just seems a little out of place compared to all the other gags in the video but those are pretty minor critiques. While I thought this ad was pretty weird at first I it was effective because it got my attention and in the advertising world, weird is good.

NBC Insider Article: https://www.nbc.com/nbc-insider/the-office-x-minions-crossover-video