De La Cruz Oglivy's Bad Bunny bet wins in Direct
- Jun 25
- 2 min read
Nobody knew which songs Bad Bunny would play in his Super Bowl half-time show in February. But Puerto Rican delivery firm UVA App’s bet that he’d play the one that
mentioned its brand paid off handsomely — including a Cannes Lion Direct Grand Prix.
Its campaign, devised by De La Cruz Ogilvy, San Juan, promised to slash the prices of a range of products within the app to $1, but only if Bad Bunny sang the lyric ‘Uva Uva Bombón’ from his song Titi Me Preguntó during the half-time show. He did, and the products all sold out before the show ended, handing UVA App one of the biggest marketing wins of the night.
“Our industry right now is all about control, and all about ‘How can you assure me this is going to work?’ This case proves, in a very simple way, the disproportionate impact that you can get when you take risks,” said Jury President Joaquín Cubría, chief creative officer at GUT, Argentina.
“We felt really strong for this one, and we got there pretty fast in the Grand Prix discussion.”
The Direct category had 1,325 entries this year, with Golds awarded to work from the US (3), UK and Canada, as well as collaborations from agencies in Italy/ Brazil and the US/Mexico.
“It was a great year for direct,” Cubría said.
“Some rules are being reinvented about what Direct is. The playbook is not the same.”
On trends, he suggested that “we saw a lot of power back in consumers’ hands”, as well as plenty of “great examples that proved there’s still love for human value in whatever you’re doing”.
Cubría also highlighted work that focused on preserving communities in countries like Paraguay, as well as globally relevant work from brands like Heineken that leaned in to what Direct can deliver.
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