Cat Stevens? Cat Power? Diamonds?

DeBeers' famous line “A diamond is forever” is always the starting point for any commercial we set out to create for for the brand. In this case, how could we bring a fresh, not-too-Christmass-y feeling to their annual campaign?

I wrote this at JWT/NY, originally setting it in the country, but then we switched it to a New York City location. To score this commercial, we took the old Cat Stevens song ‘How Can I tell You?’ and had indie darling Cat Power re-record in her smoky, emotive way. This work created a pop-culture moment that drove holiday sales for DeBeers in the US market, and won a bunch of awards for advertising effectiveness.

In a pre-social media climate, it created (and still does) divided opinions. Cat Power still gets requests to perform it at live shows, more than ten years later.