U.S. Army brings back ‘Be All You Can Be’ in major rebranding

UPDATE March 26, 2023: The Army has pulled the new ads featuring Jonathan Majors for the time being following his arrest March 25 on assault and harassment charges following a domestic dispute. “While Mr. Majors is innocent until proven guilty, prudence dictates that we pull our ads until the investigation into these allegations is complete,” Laura DeFrancisco, public affairs chief at the Army Enterprise Marketing Office, said in a statement. DeFrancisco further told Ad Age: “Our team is working quickly to reduce any impacts of this shift. When the Army launched its new brand and ‘Be All You Can Be’ tagline earlier this month, it launched a multifaceted, multichannel national campaign to support it. The two ads featuring Jonathan Majors are only one piece of that campaign. While these two ads have been pulled from rotation, the remainder of the ‘Be All You Can Be’ campaign will remain in market, inclusive of immersive activations—including the Army’s upcoming presence at the NCAA March Madness Final Four—and promotional assets distributed across television, print, digital billboards, streaming video, social and community platforms, and audio channels.” Original story is below. — — — The U.S. Army is out with a new brand campaign that aims to redefine what “Be All You Can Be” means for a new generation. That slogan, introduced in 1981 but dormant since 2001, returns in a new campaign. The rebrand also incorporates a re-engineered five-point star logo, a new custom font, an expanded color palette, new iconography, photography, motion graphics and more. The goal of the rebrand and the new campaign is to communicate to young people the countless possibilities in the Army for them to explore their passions, build community and become the best versions of themselves. Two cinematic films star “Creed III” actor Jonathan Majors. They journey through time, showing battlefields throughout the Army’s history. Rupert Sanders (“Snow White and the Huntsman,” “Ghost in the Shell”) directed the spots, which were created by DDB, the Army's agency since 2018. “The new brand is the most recent example of how the Army is modernizing its programs and policies to meet the needs of a new generation. It’s also a testament to the timelessness of ‘Be All You Can Be,’” Maj. Gen. Alex Fink, chief of enterprise marketing at the U.S. Army, told Ad Age. “My father was in the Air Force. My grandfathers were in the Army and the Navy,” Majors said Wednesday at a launch event for the campaign. “I believe that the imagination and the possibilities of life are something that has moved me forward, the imagination and the bravery of my grandfather that instilled in me this idea that I could do whatever it is I wanted to.” Ad Age Leading Women and Rising Stars Last call for the annual awards Enter here The rebrand hinges on one word: possibilities. This follows a multiyear, research-based brand transformation process that found 92% of American youth are unaware of what the Army has to offer to achieve their goals. “Research tells us that youth seek out paths filled with possibilities of purpose, passion, community and connection; however, they don’t see the Army as an organization that can set them on those paths,” said Maj. Gen. Fink. Ads will run across TV and print, streaming video, social and community platforms and audio channels such as YouTube, Hulu, Reddit, Meta and Pandora, and in partnership activations with the NCAA, Complex, IGN and NBCU. Print advertisements and digital billboards will be displayed in high-traffic markets and in locations such as college campuses and near Army bases. The campaign will air during this month’s NCAA March Madness tournament. An NBCUniversal partnership begins in May.

U.S. Army brings back ‘Be All You Can Be’ in major rebranding

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