City firms bank on ‘savvy’ advertising campaign to push Brits towards investing | Investments
City firms are pinning their hopes on a government-sanctioned advertising blitz led by a finance-“savvy” CGI squirrel to encourage cautious British savers to ditch cash and start investing.
The long-awaited retail investment campaign, which will cost up to £50 million, is part of Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ drive to encourage greater financial risk-taking across the country, amid fears that risk-averse consumers will lose out and ultimately stunt Britain’s growth.
Chris Cummings, chief executive of the Investment Association lobby group, which is leading the campaign, said: “Every year since the global financial crisis we have been treated to more benign regulations aimed at protecting the consumer.
“But what we’ve come to is protecting people from the capital markets, and that’s why we’re in this situation.”
The campaign, which was first announced during Reeves’ speech at Mansion House last summer, will run for three to five years at an annual cost of around £8 million to £10 million. The sum will be covered by 20 City backers including Barclays, Aviva, Schroders, Robinhood UK, L&G and JP Morgan.
So far this has led to the creation of an animated squirrel called “Savvy”; The squirrel will force animal-loving Britons to dive into the financial markets with a series of online, TV and billboard ads airing from Thursday.
“We didn’t want an Einstein running the investment campaign. That could have distracted people,” Cummings said. “And so we were looking for a character that people could relate to and enjoy spending time with, and Savvy the Squirrel delivered… [as] someone they feel they can chat with.
“Obviously it’s a British red squirrel,” Cummings added. Campaign slogans include “Wasting your money?” and “Have you saved some? Why not invest some?”
The ad design was carried out by media agencies M+C Saatchi and the7stars.
This follows controversy in February over the design and costs of the advertising campaign.According to Financial TimesHe obtained AI-generated sketch designs of a different red squirrel, one in a jacuzzi, the other lounging poolside with a drink in a Hawaiian shirt. AJ Bell said that Interactive Investor, Trading 212, Freetrade and Octopus Money investment platforms also withdrew from the project, primarily due to cost reasons.
The campaign, now complete, will not direct savers towards any financial products or UK-specific investments. But City lobbyists hope the campaign, alongside a growing list of other regulatory changes, could help boost the UK stock market. This comes as the London Stock Exchange continues to lose listings and looks to foreign rivals.
It will target a wide range of UK consumers, including seven million adults with more than £10,000 in cash savings, according to Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) research. The Investment Association (IA) said keeping savings in cash effectively erodes their spending power.
Modeling by the IA showed that if a saver had put £10,000 into a cash Isa ten years ago, it would be worth around £8,400 today due to inflation. If they had invested the same £10,000 in a global equity fund, their savings would now be worth more than £19,700.
The advertising blitz comes two years after the Labor government scrapped plans for a separate “Tell Sid”-style campaign featuring veteran newsreader Sir Trevor McDonald, aimed at selling the government’s remaining shares in NatWest to the British public. This was intended to evoke memories of Thatcher-era “Tell Sid” ads that encouraged ordinary consumers to buy shares in the newly privatized British Gas in 1986.
City Secretary Lucy Rigby, who launched the new retail investment campaign alongside Reeves at the London Stock Exchange on Thursday, said: “As greater awareness of the benefits of investing grows, more people will be able to make informed decisions about how to make their savings more productive for them.
“This will mean greater prosperity and financial resilience for households across the country, while also strengthening local capital markets.”
The Treasury, the Money and Pensions Service and the Financial Conduct Authority are supporting the campaign in an advisory capacity.
