Aflac to air new commercial during Olympic Games

The Aflac duck is hitting the slopes.

A snowboarding duck will appear alongside NASCAR driver Carl Edwards in Aflac’s newest commercial, set to air Friday during the 2010 Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony.

In the television spot, Edwards is challenged to explain in 10 seconds how Aflac policies help protect people.

“If you are sick or hurt, Aflac pays you cash — fast — to help pay for things major medical doesn’t cover — things like car payments, mortgage and more,” Edwards says.

The commercial, created by Tallahassee, Fla.-based The Zimmerman Agency, is expected to air about 60 times throughout the Olympic Games. It also will appear during Sunday’s Daytona 500 race and go up against other ads in this year’s Daytona Commercial Showcase.

Aflac senior vice president and chief marketing officer Jeff Charney said seeing the duck snowboarding and Edwards not sporting a NASCAR suit should grab viewers attention.

“Everything has got to be a little bit disruptive — in a good way,” he said. “You have to get people’s attention quickly.”

The commercial — the 49th spot to include the duck — is part of the company’s “You Don’t Know Quack” campaign, which launched last month and consists of 40 different elements, including billboards in Times Square and on Sunset Boulevard, huge and unconventional ads in USA Today and the Wall Street Journal, and night projections of the duck in certain cities. Its various ads lead consumers to Aflac’s revamped Web headquarters, as well as a newly created site, youdontknowquack.com.

Charney said he believes the campaign is doing well so far. The first day it launched, Aflac’s two sites had more than 170,000 hits combined — compared to 20,000 to 30,000 hits on its main Web site on an average day, he said.

This story was originally published February 11, 2010 at 5:22 PM with the headline "Aflac to air new commercial during Olympic Games."