Happy Father’s Day!
We at Dads4Kids salute you for your unswerving commitment to being a Dad. See below the 60 sec version of this year’ Father’s Day community service announcement which is now playing on the following stations across Australia: SEVEN Network, NBN Newcastle, Prime 7, Southern Cross, Imparja, WIN TV, Australian Christian Channel, SBS and Channel 31.
We always try to come up with a new advert to encourage Dads each year. It is always a challenge, but with the help of divine providence and some very creative people, we seem to be able to pull it off.
This year we had to make a very quick decision as our first idea was not working out.
So, we turned to our trusted media and creative advisor, Wayne Larkin who has 28 international and national marketing, advertising and design awards under his belt. Wayne has worked on marketing campaigns for Coca Cola, BHP, Rio Tinto and numerous multinationals.
Wayne decided to conduct some research on the most powerful words a father can say to his children. He found that there are two phrases that parenting experts and psychologists agree are more powerful than anything else and should be used as much as possible.
The two phrases are:
I am proud of you.
I love you.
After further research Wayne found that the three most powerful words, ‘I love you’, just beat ‘I am proud of you’ for first place.
Next week, Dads4Kids is releasing the ‘Courageous Fathering Course’. One whole module of this online 10 Module Video is called ‘Unconditional Love’. I would go so far to say that Unconditional Love is the foundational quality of being a good father. It is also the middle letter of Dr Bruce Robinson’s simple proposal that all fathers get on the Fatherhood BUS in order to be a great Dad.
B – is for being there.
U – is for Unconditional Love.
S – is for Make Your Children Feel Special.
Wayne Larkin created a script and submitted it to my son who runs his own production company and we both decided to give it a go.
With a streak of comedy in the message, we knew we had a challenge ahead of us. We adjusted and trimmed the script and started looking for two good comedic actors who were also deeply committed to their families.
One of the beautiful things about all our adverts is that each of the Dads (all volunteers) who feature in them is deeply committed to their children. We have handpicked them because of that quality in them. Many of our adverts consistently move people to tears.
Our first ‘Love Your Children’ TV community service announcement lasted on commercial TV for over two years because of the intrinsic integrity and love that people could feel while watching them. The amazing production quality also helped (Thank you Tay). The next advert with the same title and same music also hit the mark, demonstrating the same level of love and production (Thank you Jason). A high standard had been set, and this year we were struggling to meet it with our new message/comedy adverts.
Of course, one of the greatest challenges was to find two amazing Dads, who could act and get people to laugh. They say a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. So does laughter. Providence was kind again and we engaged Ben Price, Australia’s number one impersonator with 200 characters up his sleeve. Check this out if you want to die laughing.
The other remarkable Dad was mime artist Jack Dan Blake. Jack has been extremely popular on a number of famous TV adverts as the original Marcel Marceau in this memorable Telstra advert and this equally popular Hungry Jacks moving statues advert.
It was an absolute joy and privilege to be on set with these two deeply committed Dads in the Melbourne Monster & Bear Studios and see them interact with their children in real time – and hey, the ad was born.
Hengki Widjaja, another wonderful father and good friend, advised us to put in some much need animation and before we knew it, we had a winning advert with a winning message:
Dads come in all shapes and sizes
and do all sorts of jobs,
but the most important words
your children can hear is ‘I love you’.
Lovework
Do I really need to say it?
Have a Happy Father’s Day and tell your children the greatest thing you can say to them – I LOVE YOU!!
Yours for more love
Warwick Marsh
PS: We had hoped to release our new online ‘Courageous Fathering Course’ this week, but it now looks set for next Sunday. How exciting!
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