News

Reality Bites... and Wins!

Update: 9/6/6
Telly Award trophy *colour may differ from advertised
"Repco DIY Rescue" has been awarded a Bronze Trophy in the prestigious 27th Annual Telly Awards in the USA.

The Telly Awards honor outstanding local, regional, and cable television commercials and programs, as well as the finest video and film productions. All Telly judges are past winners of the Silver Telly, the highest honor, and are top industry professionals empowered to uphold the historical standards of the Telly competition.

Since 1978, its mission has been to strengthen the visual arts community by inspiring, promoting, and supporting creativity. The 27th Annual Telly Awards received over 12,000 entries from all 50 states and 5 continents- with only the top 20% being awarded Silver and Bronze trophies.

Update: 10/6/5
Once again we’ve been awarded Gold in the Internal Communications category of the 2005 Awards in Media Excellence announced in Las Vegas. Convened by the Media Communications Association International the annual awards celebrate excellence in media communications.

Since 1978, Golden Reel honors have been highly coveted and recognized internationally for their prestige. The name stands for creativity and advancement in technical applications. All entries in all categories are reviewed by a Blue Ribbon Panel which confers outstanding projects with Gold, Silver or Bronze Golden Reels in all categories.

Host Jeremy Corbett gets down to the crux of the story.We recently completed our first non-broadcast reality-TV show. At the end of 2004 Repco asked us come up with a memorable way of launching their upcoming computer mainframe migration. They wanted the 1000-odd team members at Repco Auto Parts stores around NZ to feel comfortable and confident about what would be one of the biggest operational changes in the company's history- one that would affect every single team member.

'Repco DIY Rescue' was the result. The award-winning team of Steve and long-time collaborator Jeremy Corbett created a hilarious send-up of the makeover/upgrade reality TV concept, where a computer rescue team is invited to take Repco's tired old computer system "from commonplace to ACE” (the name of the new system). All the traditional element are there- the gay design consultant, the deadline for completion, the dramas and personality clashes, the post-rescue review of the budget and best purchases, and, ofPaul and Jeremy "see beige" course, the unveiling of the new system to the delighted team-members.

Although the programme was a humorous spoof- featuring comedic actors playing the Rescue team, an important consideration was that the Repco team members featured could not be made fun of. And all the characters had to deliver information which was important and, in some cases quite technical, without slowing the pace of the comedy too much.

Repco ACE Project Manager Ross Gunn, only got the green light to produce the video 3 weeks before deadline but the teams were so enthused about the project that the production still went smoothly and was a great fun to work on. Here's where you can read what Ross had to say about the experience.