Milwaukee launches first ANZ brand marketing campaign
Despite already being a cult brand for tradespeople, Milwaukee Tool has leaned into brand storytelling for the first time, with a new campaign launched locally this week.
‘Forever For The Trade’ marks the brand’s first foray into brand marketing in Australia and New Zealand, as opposed to its usual product marketing. It hopes to express the brand’s “fundamental purpose” — a commitment to product innovation for tradespeople.
Head of digital and brand marketing Ayman Harrak told Mumbrella Milwaukee is in a fortunate position because of its strong product lineup.
“For us, it’s that acknowledgement of what our brand promise is and our brand commitment. And it is simple that we’re forever for the trade,” he said. “That’s our commitment to people, everything we do, everything we create and build is designed to help tradespeople do their job.”
He said this campaign also marked a pivotal moment for the brand in terms of respecting the past, but also start looking ahead.
“This has been a couple years in the making for us. We knew we needed to start telling a brand story again. And this was a chance to acknowledge the work that we have done in the past, but also look at the future in terms of telling a story that really complements the product programs we have in place at the moment.”
There’s an emotional component to the campaign, according to Harrak. Using the word ‘forever’ cements the cult brand and respects its 100-year history, while reinforcing its current positioning.
“Our commitment is being there for our users, it’s developing tools that they need and tools that are designed to be disruptive in terms of innovation, 100 years ago, we were developing tools for Henry Ford [Ford Motors founder], so I think its that symbolism of commitment to professional tradespeople that really shines through.”
While Milwaukee is making the move into brand marketing, Harrak said it will complement the brand’s product marketing activities.
“The products in these [ads] may not be the focus, but we can’t shy away or hide from that,” he told Mumbrella.
“So yes this is a different approach in terms of the storytelling, but I think we’ve seen these activities from Milwaukee before. We’ve got a really strong and connected user group that is super active on social media, and we just want to let users be the hero.”
The Milwaukee team worked closely with its agency partners — Roller (creative), Visual Domain (production), ID Collective (PR), and EssenceMediacom (media) — to deliver the campaign.
“We’re really blessed to have some really strong partners,” Harrak told Mumbrella.
“Some of them are really long standing relationships, others we’re now establishing and it’s been great to see it all come to life in a really short period of time from signing off. They’ve been amazing, they’re all great people in the teams and I’m stoked to see the partnerships come to life,” he said.
“I’m really grateful to do this campaign, this is a first for our business. It’s a huge contribution from everyone to bring it to life, and it’s super exciting for us in both Australia and New Zealand.”
The campaign is live across OOH, digital, radio, SVOD, and social media.
Credits:
Milwaukee Tool
Head of Digital & Brand Marketing ANZ: Ayman Harrak
Brand Marketing Manager: Jacqueline Murray
Creative Services Manager: Nikola Toyama
Creative: Roller
Client Lead: Taylor-Lee Selby
Art Director: Patrik Angyal
Lead Creative: Jack Davies
Executive Producer: Jeanie Edwards
Production Company: Visual Domain
Creative Director: Adam Connolly
Executive Producer: Arna Toffolo
Director of Photography: Darren Wertheim
Art Director: Pernell Marsden
Client Lead: Simon Ritch
Photographer: Jesper Hede
Editor: Adam Connolly
Colour: We Are Crayon
Sound Mix: James Martell at Pure Sound
Public Relations: iD Collective
Communications Director: Amanda Edwards
Director: Mary Morton
Media: EssenceMediacom
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Lauren McNamara is the associate editor at Mumbrella, covering the creative and PR beat. She joined in November 2022 as editorial assistant, after completing a Bachelor of Communications (Journalism) at UTS.
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Ayman Harrak
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ID Collective
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