Smol, the eco-friendly household cleaning brand, hopes to shock people fatigued by anti-plastic messaging with a bizarre TV ad that sees a washing machine vomit all the plastic waste it’s likely to generate through in its lifetime.
Created by Mother London, the campaign responds to research that found households across the UK get through over 110 million plastic laundry detergent containers per year.
The film, therefore, encourages viewers to switch to Smol, which it claims is the UK’s first brand to offer laundry capsules in plastic-free packaging.
It marks Smol's biggest marketing campaign to date.
The film was directed by Freddie Powell through Drool, and shot entirely on camera in the UK.
Hillary Strong, chief marketing officer of Smol, said: “People are well aware of the need to reduce their plastic waste, but few dwell on laundry – one of those things that we all have to buy and use, and a huge generator of single-use plastic waste.
“At Smol, we’re proud of pioneering the UK’s first plastic-free laundry capsule packaging – and know that if everyone in the UK switched to Smol, we’d prevent 70 million plastic laundry packs going to landfill every year.”
Oli Rimoldi, creative at Mother, added: “Deploying a playful metaphor to dramatise the shocking amount of laundry plastic waste the UK goes through attempts to sidestep the inertia in this market. We’re hoping the ‘plastic vomiting washing machine’ will make people smile whilst drawing their attention to the plastic problem – offering them an easy, simple solution to make change with Smol.”