When a Cheese Company Hired Dancers Instead of Models—and Why It Worked
Last month I stumbled on a video ad from a boutique Hawke’s Bay cheese brand that featured three ballet dancers in gumboots pirouetting through an actual cow paddock. No creamy b-roll of cheese pulls. No slow zooms on lusciously lit wheels of brie. Just movement, mud, and a soundtrack that felt more Berghain than Bake Off.
And it was brilliant. Not brilliant because it was ostentatious. But because it did something which too many brands forget about: it created associative memory. Every time you see a dancer now, or hear that discordant synth loop, your brain dredges up something vaguely dairy-related. That’s not coincidence. It’s design. It hijacks the sensory cues.
We are in the golden age of product storytelling, yet most storytelling has the depth of an Instagram caption and the originality of stock photography. That’s why weird wins. Not performative weird (I’m looking at you, crypto ads with mime artists), but the sort that gives your brain a bump in the timeline. That tiny flick of surprise that makes you rewatch it, not scroll past it. Dancing for cheese? That’s a dopamine hook with feet.
The agency behind this didn’t even use a tagline. Just a logo at the end. It trusted the viewer to feel something, maybe even confusion. And for once, that confusion felt honest. Like someone had fun making this and hoped you’d come along. If we want to get bums off couches and onto brand wagons, we need more pirouettes and fewer punchlines.
And it was brilliant. Not brilliant because it was ostentatious. But because it did something which too many brands forget about: it created associative memory. Every time you see a dancer now, or hear that discordant synth loop, your brain dredges up something vaguely dairy-related. That’s not coincidence. It’s design. It hijacks the sensory cues.
We are in the golden age of product storytelling, yet most storytelling has the depth of an Instagram caption and the originality of stock photography. That’s why weird wins. Not performative weird (I’m looking at you, crypto ads with mime artists), but the sort that gives your brain a bump in the timeline. That tiny flick of surprise that makes you rewatch it, not scroll past it. Dancing for cheese? That’s a dopamine hook with feet.
The agency behind this didn’t even use a tagline. Just a logo at the end. It trusted the viewer to feel something, maybe even confusion. And for once, that confusion felt honest. Like someone had fun making this and hoped you’d come along. If we want to get bums off couches and onto brand wagons, we need more pirouettes and fewer punchlines.