Jonathan Bradley. Conceptual writer and creative strategist.

Direct Line wanted to bring their direct ads in line with the Harvey Keitel Winston Wolf campaign. But there was a problem. We couldn’t show Harvey’s image or use his character’s name.

This turned out to be a great opportunity. Bringing the Wolf’s world to life with tone of voice and art direction alone freed us to create a simple, compelling, entertaining insurance DM and digital.

I also wanted to see how much the world has moved on since classic DM techniques like Johnson boxes, trial closes, multi-page letters and PPSes tested their way to ubiquity. And it turns out that today’s consumer will quite happily buy without them. In fact, in a head to head test against Direct Line’s (rather old-school) control, short and sweet won the day by a convincing margin.