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I've chatted a bit with Fredrik Olsson from Miami ad agency in Gothenburg about his recent trip to Shanghai. What is advertising like over there? Do they have really naive billboards, like ours used to be in the 60s? Do they have guerrilla advertising which is Miami's specialty? Do they have TV-ads?

Fredrik was kind enough to respond at length: The Guerrilla advertising business in Shanghai is not without its dangers...

On the last Christmas shopping weekend, Sweden's Conservatives (the right wing party) showed up with their own version of Santa, as they pre-started the election year.

The Conservatives got dressed in blue Santa suits, not the traditional red, and headed out in the crowded streets to get shoppers to stop and think about what they really want from the coming election in September. Their aim was to listen to the people and their wishes and gather wishing lists.

"The most important is to listen to what the citizens thinks. We want to realize peoples ideas, that is why we give out and gather wishing lists", says Hans Rothenberg, vice chairman for the conservative party in Göteborg.

Despite having been around as long as advertising itself, guerrilla advertising and ambient ads seem to be a little like cinderella, the step child who only gets invited to the ball because the prince is desperate. Often it seems that the guerrilla stunts are haphazardly thrown together as an after thought within a brading campaign. So I called up Miami, the ad agency who's main business is guerrilla and unusual stunts to talk about the past, present and future of these ads outside of mainstream media.

(Photograph by Karim Hatoum )
Miami advertising are located in Gothenburg, Sweden and we've previously done a spotlight on Miami. They've worked for clients as varied as Ikea and the politicial conservative party, clients as large as Mitsubishi Motors as well as small like local Spanish tapas bars. If anyone knows what they're talking about it would be Fredrik Olsson, far right above. (more inside)

Gothenburg's largest airline company, City Airline, opens a new line non-stop from Luleå to Gothenburg on the 31st of October. To spread the word of the new destination, Miami ran a guerilla campaign in Luleå last weekend.

At the same time as the Frölunda Indians was visiting Luleå for the hockey series on Saturday the 22nd of October, City Airline made a guerilla attack at specific locations in and around Luleå. A 10 person street team handed out vouchers, which included a ticket offer, a competition and an offer made together with Göteborg & Co for a tourist package, to 10,000 people.

This month in our spotlight is Fredrik Olsson from Miami, who's not from Miami at all but from Gothenburg, although he did just arrive this morning on a flight from Miami! This is confusing isn't it?
Fredrik has just been to New York and Miami this past week together with his work partner Gustaf Inger, and as soon as they was back at the office we put the spotlight on Fredrik. Perhaps slightly jetlagged but a good sport Fredrik went on to answer all our questions and show us some of his agencies work.

DB: Show us the Miami creative hot spot. Where are the ideas born?

Fredrik Olsson: In my case it's in the gut.. I know it's somewhere around here, but I'm not sure where.