Cannes Lions

Unbreakable Courts

AFRICA DDB, Sao Paulo / INSTITUTIONAL / 2022

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Overview

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Overview

Background

The Brazilian real estate market grew 21% during the pandemic. And, according to experts, the trend is to grow even more.

Street basketball courts, which are an urban stronghold of basketball culture - far beyond the sport, are directly threatened by this scenario. They are becoming parking lots, buildings, and avenues.

The brief was strengthening Budweiser's relationship with street culture and the public within it, in a relevant and game-changing way. Budweiser didn't want to be just a sponsor of the NBA. Budweiser wants to be part of the basketball and street culture in Brazil.

Idea

Without street basketball courts, sports and culture will eventually lose the game. Budweiser and the NBA have been partners for a long time, and now we are going to show that this partnership can go even further. Budweiser found a way to prevent basketball culture from being smashed by new buildings. We overcome the law, with the law itself, by hacking the system with art. According to Brazilian law: “A place of public interest with artistic value is considered public heritage and cannot be demolished”.

We have created an open-source method that allows people to turn street courts into cultural heritage sites. On our hub, anyone could register a street block and find an artist to create a piece of art for that specific court. So by filing a cultural heritage application, anyone can make a street court unbreakable.

Strategy

Budweiser has created a movement to rebuild the basketball culture in Brazil. Involving the community and empowering them to fight for their rights. With 5 steps, supported by the Brazilian legislation, we promote an open-source method to transform street courts into a cultural heritage site, spreading the method throughout the country.

But we couldn’t spread this message on TV, in OOH or in traditional media. Otherwise, they would change the law. We need to reach only the consumers of street culture and basketball. Thus, we hide the steps to make a street court unbreakable in hip hop. Rincon Sapiência, one of the greatest Brazilian rappers, has released a music video, teaching everything in a didactical way.

Execution

Instead of making the courts on its own, to scale the range of our movement, Budweiser put power in people's hands. To do this, it created a method that gave anyone the power to turn a court into indestructible. For this, we created a hub, online, in which it was enough to put the zip code of the court that person wanted to preserve and find an artist among our options for him/her to make the artistic intervention in the place. In addition to this bridge of connection between society and art, it is our responsibility to sponsor the work.

Outcome

The basketball community embraced the movement and Budweiser became one of the most respected brands in the Brazilian basketball culture. Budweiser empowered people. This made them believe that it is possible to change things. And if there is one thing that sports can teach us, it is that we should never give up the game.

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