evian - Welcome to the Mountain of Youth - (2024) France

After over a decade of celebrated and multi-awarded campaigns with the ‘famous’ evian babies, BETC Paris and evian write together a new chapter in the history of the brand and invite us all to discover ‘The Mountain of Youth’. This new global brand platform will take us on a fun, whimsical journey into the heart of the Alps, where the source of evian water begins.

The campaign reignites the iconic ‘Live Young’ brand signature, inspiring people to adopt a rejuvenating experience for the body and mind in a playful mindset, regardless of age. By cleverly twisting the universal magic water myth, the Fountain of Youth, BETC pays an homage to evian’s unique heritage of the pristine French Alps, where evian’s mountain-made mineral water is sourced through 15 years of natural filtration through Alpine glacial rocks.

And in this magical three-peaked land, guarding the evian water, lives a group of ‘mountain fairy like people we call the ‘Evianers’. They are youthful, light-hearted, and cheeky.  

The film follows an intrepid explorer who travels across the Alps in search of the prized source of the Mountain of Youth. But once he finds the actual location, he investigates every corner of the area without success. What he doesn’t know is that he’s constantly being watched and followed by the playful ‘evianers’ who have found incredible fun ways of camouflaging within the environment. Their amazing costumes make them look like stalactites, trees, rocks, floating pieces of ice or even the abominable snow man! They playfully interact with our explorer when he’s not looking in a cheeky game of hide and seek, just enough to cast a doubt in his mind, but not enough to reveal themselves. But once our explorer has almost given up on his search, they decide to let him in on their secret and give him a departing gift: a bottle of evian water. The true source of the Mountain of Youth.

The true source of the Mountain of Youth.

The film was produced by Wanda and directed by the acclaimed Henry Scholfield who jumped to fame by directing music videos for various artists like Dua Lipa, Billie Eilish, Rosalia amongst others as well as commercials for brands such as Adidas, Stella Artois, Opel Corsa and Samsung. 

 The Mountain of Youth universe is set to the track “JOY” by  Pharrell Williams, which reflects the youthful and playful spirit of evian and is the perfect embodiment of the Live Young mindset. 

Henry Scholfied, Director:

“I loved how this concept is actually an excellent life philosophy, ‘Live Young!’, cleverly disguised as a brand campaign. I wanted this irreverence and joie de vivre to come to life in each of our depictions of their world, from what they do to what they wear, whilst capturing the spirit of the Mountain of Youth, and its inhabitants who are a lotta bit mischievous and a little bit wild.”

For the print and out of home campaign BETC and evian worked with acclaimed fashion photographer Dario Catellani to bring to life fun slice of life moments of the mischievous Evianer tribe. Including three shots of an Evianer using the body of a snowman as a yoga ball to stretch under the eyes of the surprised snowman head. A mother and child cheekily leaving yeti footprints in the snow using their bigger than life yeti sized snow boots and a couple of senior Evianers gleefully jumping into an ice hole as if it were a kids’ pool. 

The Mountain of Youth platform has even been brought to life with a series of fun print and OOH executions that show evian’s global brand ambassadors like tennis stars Emma Raducanu, Frances Tiafoe and Stan Wawrinka playing tennis in snow rackets under the eyes of a snowman referee alongside evian ambassador, French golf champion Celine Boutier playing golf on ice skates on a frozen lake.

Antoinette Beatson, VP/ECD BETC Paris:

“Great excitement on the part of both evian and BETC teams as we pick up where we left off and continue the amazing Live Young saga. Our new The Mountain Youth concept sheds a new light on youthfulness while keeping the DNA of the brand”.

Dawid Borowiec, evian: 

“evian has a strong heritage in iconic advertising. Our new campaign, the Mountain of Youth, continues that tradition with fabulous images and stories full of French chic and unconventional flair that are so typical of evian. We hope The Mountain of Youth will help evian achieve its purpose of inspiring people to live young - embracing a rejuvenating, youthful lifestyle, no matter your age.”

The campaign TV, OOH, print, digital assets will be running globally starting in May.

Campaign: Mountain of Youth
Brand: evian
Brand Managers: Antoine Portmann, Dawid Borowiec, Isabella Bertin
Ad Agency: BETC Paris
Agency Managers: Mercedes Erra, Dominique Verot, Anne-Laure Brunner, Marie-Alice Poisson, Lauryane Sam, Alice Morel, Amelie Velly
Chief Creative Officer: Remi Babinet
Executive Creative Director: Antoinette Beatson
Creative Director: David Martin Angelus
Art Director: Aurelie Scalabre
Copywriters: Olivier Mille, Nadia Doherty
Assistants Art Directors: Florian Padilla, Romane Bouvrain, Justin Reich
Strategic Planners: Clement Boisseau, Alexandre Ben-Soussan, Tomas Couvry
Creative Resources Coordinator: Elodie Diana
Creative Producer: Laure Denizot
Production Company: Wanda
Director: Henry Scholfield
Art Buyer: Stephanie Giordano
Photographer: Dario Catellani
Sound Company: GUM