OTC advertising can be blah. Bureau of Everything’s work for Ferro-grad C isn’t. It’s a very clever reworking of Sleeping Beauty, with Ferro-grad C as the hero and “Sleeping Beauty”, aka Sleepy Moody, as the heroine who didn’t need rescuing from any Prince Charming. She’d already revived a few weeks ago. “She’s probably in the boardroom, or Byron…she just needed Ferro-grad.”
The new brand platform and campaign, Energy Ferro-After, positions the brand as a faster-acting, first line defence for iron deficiency, challenging outdated narratives that men need to sweep in to save the day, instead casting women as the heroes, taking their well-being into their own hands.
On top of the commercial’s entertaining story idea and inspiring “women can do anything” underpinning, is the production. The Bureau of Everything team collaborated with ex-Disney animators at production company, Cirkus, to bring the idea of an alternate fairytale ending to life. Crafted frame by frame with hand animation over months, each scene unfolds against richly painted backgrounds with subtle subversive touches, deliberately breaking away from the category’s predictable visuals of smiling, dancing women against branded backdrops.
BoE founder, Cam Blackley, explained, “We took great care in finding the right production partner to craft the idea of rewritten fairytales authentically. This is the kind of work that proves that you can create cut-through in any category (even one that discusses constipation) if you have an entertaining, well- executed idea.”
Iron deficiency affects nearly one in three Australian women, often leaving them feeling fatigued*. One obstacle to iron supplementing is women’s worry that taking iron supplements can come with a constipation side effect that might make them feel worse. Rather than delivering the facts in a conventional way, the campaign takes a more entertaining approach.
Laurent De Meyer, general manager of wellness at Ferro-grad parent, VidaCorp, noted that the campaign marks a shift in how the category is approached, “Iron supplement advertising has traditionally been functional and uninspiring. With our new campaign, Ferro-grad reimagines the category through the lens of the Sleeping Beauty fairytale, transforming it into a powerful metaphor for the fatigue of iron deficiency. It’s a celebration of women rising, re-energised and ready to take on the world.”
The campaign will roll out across TV, online video, YouTube and pharmacy channels.
Credits
Creative Office: Bureau of Everything
CCO: Cam Blackley
Creative Director: Jardin Anderson
Chief Strategy Officer: Emily Taylor
Group Strategy Director: Vanessa Graham
Group Business Director: Esther Knox
Executive Producer: Cathy Rechichi
Producer: Zorrica Blackley
Production Company: Cirkus
Animation Direction: Christian Greet
Storyboarding: Amber Edwards
Illustration: Amber Edwards, Christian Misola Fenis, Bo Klijn, Dilmi Amarasinghe
Animation: Jared Beckstrand, Amber Edwards, Christian Misola Fenis, Kai Phillip, Sophia Aizon and Ty Jepsen
Producer: Marko Klijn
Client: VidaCorp
General Manager, Wellness: Laurent De Meyer
Marketing Manager Olivia Grey
*Source of iron deficiency statistic: Ideally quantitative research, May 2025, n = 297.
