Everybody sits: inside Look’s global campaign for Herman Miller — The Brand Identity – Home of the Greatest in Graphic & Brand Design

“Millions of people sit in a Herman Miller chair. Millions of people love their Herman Miller chair. Why doesn’t everybody sit in a Herman Miller chair?” Those three lines opened the brief that Herman Miller sent to a small set of agencies with its request for proposals, Senior Marketing Director Jenelle Kelsch tells us. Look sent back a question of its own, ‘What’s up with everyone who doesn’t sit in a Herman Miller chair?’ and with it the prompt for the campaign: if all those everybodies understood what sitting in a Herman Miller chair can add to life, they would add one to their own life. The resulting global campaign by the London, New York and Los Angeles-based creative agency moves the subject from the chair to the act of sitting, revolving around the line: ‘Sit Your Best.’

“Herman Miller’s design philosophy is essentially to put people first. Their chairs are created to adapt to you, not the other way around,” Chief Creative Officer Suzy Shaheen explains. “So, we focused on the humanity, the personality and the individuality of the ‘sitters’ – showing the endless range of ways people lounge, lean, careen and still fit comfortably in their Herman Miller chairs. That led to some quirky casting, posing and choreography you wouldn’t expect from an office seating company.” Kelsch points back to the video that introduced Herman Miller’s Equa chair in 1984. Once you have seen it, Kelsch notes, “you’ll understand that we don’t create straightforward product campaigns.”

The campaign’s manifesto makes its claim plainly: that sitting is done best on a chair ‘engineered for your health.’ “The thing about Herman Miller designs is that they are so advanced, they’re simple,” Shaheen continues. “That set the tone for our manifesto – Everybody sits (often over 7 hours a day!), so why not choose a chair that was designed to help you do it better? The mechanics of the chairs may be complex, but advantages are hit-you-over-the-head simple. We wanted to bring that simplicity and clarity to the campaign both in the copy and visuals.” Herman Miller’s ergonomic research sits behind how its chairs are engineered. “Designer Bill Stumpf spent decades studying the effects of sitting on the human body,” Kelsch explains, “everything from fatigue and cognition to back pain. He incorporated what he learned into our Ergon, Equa, Aeron and Embody chairs. He believed that people could be more creative if they weren’t distracted by physical discomfort and if poor posture didn’t inhibit blood circulation.” Kelsch offers Embody, designed by Stumpf with Jeff Weber, as an example of that research; when Stumpf died in 2006, Weber carried on, “giving the chair its function and form, building on Stumpf’s inspiration.”

Working inside Herman Miller’s broader design language, Look put the focus on scale, rhythm and pacing, taking the manufacturer’s archive of visual material as the campaign’s starting point. Statements are set large on bold colour, with generous space around them. “We felt the brand had such a great story to tell; why not just spell it out – literally,” Shaheen adds.

Max Siedentopf shot the stills and video. “Max has a distinctive ability to balance the everyday with the unexpected, which we wanted to bring to this campaign,” Shaheen details. “We knew he’d be perfect to bring irreverence and whimsy to the everyday act of sitting. There was always a balance to strike; the humour needed to punctuate the idea that we all sit and Herman Miller is here to support you in whatever way you choose to do that.” The campaign also features a set of social media shorts. “They became a fun opportunity to crystallise our message or focus attention on a point or feature,” Shaheen continues. “With a finite amount of time to capture the viewer’s attention, each film had to be more immediate and provocative, yet able to stand on its own. We were able to retain the idea in very short moments through focusing on distinct personalities of our characters.”

“Everyone sits. So everyone gets it,” Shaheen notes. “The strength of the campaign is that it wasn’t built around cultural or market-specific messaging; it’s a human truth that just translates (although we did run into issues on how to translate the part of the body you sit on).”

“We created a flexible design system rather than a fixed set of assets,” Shaheen adds. “The manifesto, typography, photography style and art direction formed a consistent framework, while the executions could adapt across different formats, products and markets.”

“The campaign resonated strongly with consumers,” Kelsch details. “The billboards delivered standout visibility and social content drove meaningful engagement and reinforced the relevance of the ‘Sit Your Best’ message.” Inside the business, Kelsch concludes, the response “has been highly positive, with teams rallying around the campaign’s clear articulation of our expertise and purpose. The campaign has generated strong enthusiasm and pride across the organisation.”