Bank of New Zealand Makes Saving Personal With What Ella Wants
Bank of New Zealand's 'What Ella Wants' is a narrative-driven film campaign created by Colenso BBDO and released in New Zealand in February 2019, using the story of a father and his seven-year-old daughter to illustrate that saving money requires real sacrifice and deliberate choice.
The campaign entered the New Zealand market as a continuation of BNZ's long-running 'be good with money' brand platform, which, according to Ads of the World, had been in active development since around 2017. Rather than leading with product features or interest rates, 'What Ella Wants' anchored BNZ's positioning in an emotionally familiar domestic scenario — a child's aspirations measured against a parent's financial reality. That structural choice reflects a deliberate move away from the transactional register that dominates banking communication in New Zealand and toward something closer to consumer storytelling.
Across its release, the campaign ran on television in 60-second, 30-second, and 15-second formats, as well as online, in cinemas, in BNZ branches, and across nationwide out-of-home placements, as documented by Ads of the World. The multi-channel deployment gave 'What Ella Wants' broad reach in the New Zealand market while ensuring the narrative had room to breathe in its longer-form executions. The film was directed by Glendyn Ivin of Exit Film, bringing a considered, character-led sensibility to material that could easily have defaulted to sentiment. A follow-up campaign, 'The Kids' Room', was released in October 2019, confirming that the Ella narrative was conceived not as a standalone spot but as the foundation of an ongoing creative platform, as reported by Clapboard. Clapboard scores 'What Ella Wants' at 63 out of 100.
New Zealand's banking sector is concentrated. In 2019, the four largest banks — ASB, ANZ, BNZ, and Westpac — controlled approximately 88 percent of retail and commercial banking assets, according to Ads of the World, with the top five institutions including Kiwibank accounting for approximately 91 percent of those assets. In a market where scale and product parity are the structural norm, differentiation through brand feeling rather than feature comparison becomes a logical strategic response.
BNZ's decision to build 'What Ella Wants' around a savings narrative rather than a rate or product proposition reflects that logic directly. As Briar Rowe, Acting Head of Brand at Bank of New Zealand, stated as reported by The Drum, BNZ had been 'focussed on the optimistic evolution of be good with money for a couple of years now', with the brand consistently showing New Zealanders in everyday situations and demonstrating how BNZ products and services help them manage money well. That continuity of purpose across the 'be good with money' platform, which according to Clapboard traces back to approximately 2017, positioned BNZ as a brand with a coherent point of view rather than a rotating suite of promotional messages.
Competitors ASB and ANZ both maintained significant brand investment in the New Zealand market during this period, with ASB in particular holding a reputation for warm, character-driven advertising. Against that backdrop, BNZ's choice to build a two-character story around a child's articulated want — and the parental decision-making it forces — gave 'What Ella Wants' a specific emotional register that product-led executions from its competitors could not easily replicate. The insight is precise: saving is not abstract; it is the daily management of competing desires within a household.
Glendyn Ivin directed 'What Ella Wants' for Bank of New Zealand through Exit Film. Ivin's involvement signals a production ambition appropriate to the campaign's narrative-first strategy: his background in character-driven storytelling, well established in Australian and New Zealand screen culture, brings a restraint and observational quality to the father-daughter dynamic at the heart of the film.
The creative team at Colenso BBDO was led by Steve Cochran, Executive Creative Director, whose perspective on the work was reported by The Drum and MAD Daily. Cochran described following up the 'Bank of New Zealanders' work 'with a sweet little story' as a delight, framing the creative ambition in terms of warmth and specificity rather than scale. That self-description is telling. 'What Ella Wants' does not attempt the panoramic — it works within the confined emotional geometry of two people and the gap between what a child desires and what a parent can responsibly provide.
The casting of a seven-year-old girl named Ella as the campaign's central figure is a craft decision with strategic weight. Children in advertising carry a particular emotional charge in the New Zealand market, and anchoring the savings message in a child's named, specific want — rather than a generic parental aspiration — grounds the narrative in something concrete. The multi-format production across 60-second, 30-second, and 15-second television edits, alongside cinema, online, and out-of-home executions documented by Ads of the World, required the core story to function at different levels of compression without losing its emotional logic. That the campaign successfully commissioned a sequel, 'The Kids' Room', suggests the creative foundation was sufficiently robust to sustain extension. Production credits beyond Glendyn Ivin and Steve Cochran are not fully documented across available public sources.
No verified performance data for 'What Ella Wants' is publicly available. No documented metrics covering brand lift, recall, sales attribution, or digital engagement have been reported by The Drum, MAD Daily, Ads of the World, or any other identifiable source in connection with this campaign. Equally, no award show entries or wins for 'What Ella Wants' have been identified across major industry bodies in the New Zealand or broader APAC region.
Structural analysis offers a qualified read of its likely effectiveness. The campaign's clearest commercial signal is the commissioning of 'The Kids' Room' in October 2019 — a direct continuation of the Ella narrative, as documented by Clapboard. Creative platforms are rarely extended when the originating work fails to register either commercially or culturally. The decision to return to the same characters and emotional territory within the same calendar year implies internal confidence in what 'What Ella Wants' established.
The campaign's multi-channel deployment across television, cinema, online, in-branch, and nationwide out-of-home placements, as confirmed by Ads of the World, reflects the media investment levels consistent with a campaign BNZ expected to sustain attention over time rather than generate a single moment of exposure. Within BNZ's 'be good with money' platform, 'What Ella Wants' functions as the consumer-facing articulation of a brand strategy that Briar Rowe, Acting Head of Brand at Bank of New Zealand, confirmed had been consistent for several years, according to The Drum. That platform coherence is a structural asset in a concentrated market where rivals ASB and ANZ compete for similar emotional territory. Clapboard scores 'What Ella Wants' at 63 out of 100, reflecting a well-crafted narrative execution that operates within, rather than significantly beyond, the conventions of its category.
'What Ella Wants' is a 2019 film campaign created by Colenso BBDO for Bank of New Zealand. It depicts a father and his seven-year-old daughter navigating the reality that saving requires sacrifice. The campaign ran across television, cinema, online, in-branch, and nationwide out-of-home media in New Zealand as part of BNZ's 'be good with money' platform.
Colenso BBDO created 'What Ella Wants' for Bank of New Zealand. Steve Cochran served as Executive Creative Director at Colenso BBDO, and the film was directed by Glendyn Ivin of Exit Film. The campaign was released in New Zealand in February 2019, as documented by The Drum and Ads of the World.
'What Ella Wants' belongs to BNZ's 'be good with money' platform. According to Ads of the World, this platform has been active since approximately 2017. Briar Rowe, Acting Head of Brand at Bank of New Zealand, confirmed the brand had been focused on the optimistic evolution of this message for several years, as reported by The Drum.
BNZ released 'The Kids' Room' in October 2019 as a direct continuation of 'What Ella Wants', according to Clapboard. The follow-up campaign extended the Ella narrative and ran across television, online, and cinema in New Zealand, suggesting the original creative platform had sufficient internal and market traction to sustain a sequel within the same year.
'What Ella Wants' ran across television in 60-second, 30-second, and 15-second formats, as well as online, in cinemas, in BNZ branches, and across nationwide out-of-home placements in New Zealand, as documented by Ads of the World. The multi-channel deployment reflected BNZ's intention to give the narrative sustained reach across the New Zealand market.
Clapboard scores 'What Ella Wants' at 63 out of 100. This reflects a competently crafted, narrative-led campaign that communicates BNZ's savings proposition with emotional specificity. The score indicates solid execution within the conventions of New Zealand banking advertising without significantly redefining the category or demonstrating measurable creative breakthrough against competitors such as ASB and ANZ.
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