Sarofsky’s fun, animated approach to beverage video

An animated 60-second video for Mike’s Hard Lemonade, a flavored malt beverage, was created by Sarofsky Corp. for Tris3ct’s client Mike’s Hard Lemonade Co. and launched on YouTube and Vimeo as a precursor to its summer campaign.

Tris3ct went to Sarofsky with a unique take on the hard lemonade brand, showing how its taste was developed from fresh lemons and flavors made from scratch, “to bring you the best to make the good times better,” the narrator says.

“A lot of brands in the alcohol beverage category talk about quality, but Mike’s is an authentic, unconventional brand.  Rather than show sweeping shots of verdant lemon groves, we chose to capture this story in a way as unexpected as the brand itself,” notes Sanjiv Gajiwala, Mike’s Hard Lemonade VP/marketing.

Sarofsky’s creative approach was to give movement to a static bottle of Mike’s, shot table-top style.  As the story unfolds, the live bottle moves against stylized black-and-white animated scenes.

“We kept the illustration style and color palette very minimal, which allowed us to let the hero bottle shine, as well the personalities of our animated characters,” says Erin Sarofsky.

“Mike’s is a fun and irreverent brand, so our goal was to showcase that with all the little details we added. We guarantee that you will see something new every time you watch it.”

For Tris3ct: CD, Craig Miller; producers: Bryan Haney, Judd Stricker

Sarofsky Corp.: ECD, Erin Sarofsky; CD, John Filipkowski; EP, Steven Anderson; producer: Michael Burke; DP, Steven Piet; VFX supervisor, Matt Crnich; illustrator: Chris Anderson; CG director, Andy Zazzera; 2D animators, Duarte Elvas, Tanya Witmer, CJ Cook, Patrick Coleman, Brent Austin, James Nicky 
3D animator, Alex Kline; junior designer, Bhakti Patel