NERF: Nerf House

NERF and NFL, a match made in heaven. Or in this case, a match made by our commercial production company.

In 2020, NERF called on us to bring to life a campaign that would marry well-known NFL players with the brand to create a viral campaign that would aim to bring about more brand awareness.

NERF sought to piggyback on the attention brought by the Super Bowl and create a comedy campaign that would parody a sitcom, showing all the NFL stars play-fighting at the so-called NERF HOUSE. As the Super Bowl was taking place in Miami, our Los Angeles-based company filmed in Miami as well.

Our biggest hurdle right off the bat was pulling this production together in two days time. We needed to secure a large home that would allow for multiple sets and we also needed an area for our makeup and hair crew to prep several NFL players.

In addition, we had to make the end result appear as if five NFL athletes were all together in one room when, in reality, they were barely together throughout the shoot. This was a like one big puzzle, one which our director handled wonderfully, both creatively and logistically.

Lastly, filming throughout the week of the Super Bowl presents a whole set of challenges in and of itself, including the fact that the best crew members were already booked for other productions. Miami police would need to be on scene, and it was difficult to secure even one officer. However, we used our experience and connections to source the finest crew that would work to our strict standards.

In just one day of video production, we produced content for use in five videos, which were launched week after week by NERF, Julian Edelman, and other NFL stars. The videos received more than 600,000 views, boosting brand value and awareness.

Artex was responsible for executing this video production in Miami. For any brands who need an 11th hour, seemingly-impossible shoot like this, we have one thing to say: we’re up for the challenge.