Thumbtack's talking thumb will nag you on home tasks
L&C New York crafted debut campaign for the home services app with Framestore Pictures
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The debut TV campaign for Thumbtack, a home services app that connects people with home improvement professionals, takes creative inspiration from its name and features a talking thumb.
L&C New York (Ad Age's A List 2022 Newcomer of the Year agency) created the campaign, which was built off a simple human insight: all of us want to keep our homes in good condition, but most of us put off doing the work until tomorrow. So, in the ad, a woman's thumb starts speaking to her when she's mindlessly scrolling through videos in bed, reminding her to fix her broken blinds.
"The thumb character represents the inner voice inside of each one of us," explained Rolando Cordova, co-founder and chief creative officer at L&C, in a statement. "When it comes to home repairs, we’re all guilty of saying to ourselves, 'I need to fix this tomorrow.' But then tomorrow comes and you never do it. The thumb is there to serve as our conscience and get us to take action today.”
L&C worked with Framestore Pictures and director Chris Waitt to bring to life the thumb, with its little slit for a mouth. The remote production included a live action shoot based in Cape Town that included getting the actor to interact with the thumb as if it had come alive. Post production was by Framestore.
“I loved the quirkiness and originality of the script," said Waitt. "The idea of a talking thumb felt like one of those ideas that was very surreal. It felt like it had charm about it. Even though the script is pretty off beat, we didn’t want to play the comedy too broadly at all, so the tone had to feel naturalistic and real—everything from the casting of the thumb voice to my directing of the lead actors was guided by that idea of realism.”
Thumbtack, which started working with L&C late last year, aims to establish itself as the partner for homeowners in the continuous care of their homes. The ad is running across TV and social media.
"Since people are emotionally invested in their homes, we wanted to create a campaign that resonates with homeowners across the country with a different, yet relatable, type of work," said Diego Figueroa, head of brand marketing at Thumbtack.
