Palio

Tough Guys

Palio

BRAND Colcrys CLIENT URL Pharma

People don't traditionally relate Earl Grey tea with the image of a rough and tumble biker. That's exactly the contrast Palio wanted physicians to see when it launched its ad campaign for URL Pharma's gout treatment Colcrys, a new brand established from a legacy drug. The drug had recently completed a battery of testing to establish a new treatment regiment that lowered the instances of side-effects. The ad visually marries the drug's well-known strength with the new refinements discovered through clinical trials. "Because there weren't established dosing guidelines as to how to administer Colcrys, no one knew what was an appropriate dose," says Palio's VP, Associate Creative Director, Neall Currie. "The leading association with Colcrys was that it worked, but it had these severe GI side effects." The biggest challenge was to change physicians' negative perceptions that might have carried over from the older treatment. The characters used in the ad have a bit of an outcast nature to them. They're tough guys—outlaws, even. Palio wanted doctors to visualize the brutish strength representative of what Colcrys was, while adding a subtle, comical twist to show what it has become.

FROM LEFT: Julie Priddle, account director, Amanda Murphy, senior copywriter, Neall Currie, VP, associate creative director, Joe Acee, group art supervisor, Eric Delnicki, group art supervisor