Yorkshire Building Society rolls out Tour de France campaign

The YBS poster campaign, created by Soul, launches on 30 June ahead of the start of the Tour de France. The first stages take place in Yorkshire on 5 and 6 July, before the tour heads to Cambridge, London and then mainland Europe.

YBS is the official broadcast sponsor of the first three stages of the Tour de France, known as the Grand Départ, on ITV.

The campaign will consist of television idents, press ads, 48-sheet billboard posters and posters in YBS branches.

The television idents will be shots of local shop signs which have been given a French twist, such as bed & breakfast becoming bed & petit dejeuner.

The posters focus on the allure of the Yorkshire countryside as a backdrop to the world’s most famous bicycle road race, with one poster targeting cyclists heading out of Leeds into the countryside captioned: “Yorkshire. The most beautiful race track in the world.”

Other posters in campaign carry the captions: “When Yorkshire plays host to the world, we’ll be here” and “cyclists, this is what you’ve got to look forward to”.

Anna Higgins, the customer marketing manager at YBS, said: “Soul has become our go-to agency for creative initiatives.

“It has developed a campaign concept that encapsulates both our immense pride and the entire county’s excitement about the race.

“We’re supporting a global event that will bring the eyes of the world to the UK and to Yorkshire in particular.”

The creative director for the campaign was Shaun Moran, the senior art director was James Ellis, the head of art was Paul Walton and the senior copywriter was Linda Cash, all from Soul.

Moran said: “Our brief was to communicate not only how proud YBS is to sponsor the Tour de France Grand Départ, but how proud it is of Yorkshire, it’s our home.

“We’ve used stunning images of the Yorkshire Dales and other parts of the county to show both cyclists and observers what’s waiting for them.”

Dom Sykes directed the idents through Rock Hound, while the media buying company for the campaign was UM Birmingham.

Article first published 25 June 2014 in Campaign