#342 2025 · Viatris (Viagra, agency: Ogilvy Shanghai) · Pharmaceuticalswrong-door
Viatris, blocked from advertising Viagra directly under China's ban on prescription-drug ads and its taboo around intimacy, let real couples' time-lapse portraits carry the message instead, with the brand surfacing only as the pill's silhouette in the final frame
the problem
Can't advertise the drug or discuss its purpose openly in China
background
China prohibits direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription drugs, and Viagra's actual subject — erectile dysfunction and sexual intimacy — is culturally taboo, rarely discussed openly even in private, let alone in mass media. That leaves a category with real, widespread need but no legal or culturally acceptable channel through which the brand can speak about what it actually treats or why it matters to people's relationships.
For Valentine's Day 2025, Viatris and Ogilvy Shanghai released 'Make Love Last,' an unbranded art and photography project built from time-lapse and long-exposure footage of three real couples, focused on the passage of time and emotional connection in long relationships rather than anything explicit or clinical. Only in the closing frame does the outline of the brand's iconic blue diamond-shaped pill appear, alongside a closing line, functioning as both a subtle product cue and a broader statement.
the move
Instead of an ad for the drug, Ogilvy Shanghai produced a time-lapse and long-exposure art and photography piece documenting three real couples' intimacy and emotional bond over time, released as an unbranded piece around Valentine's Day. The Viagra brand only appears at the very end, via the pill's diamond silhouette and a closing line.
the payoff
The work won the first-ever Pharma Grand Prix at Cannes Lions 2025 plus the Grand Prix for Film Craft: Cinematography, with jurors specifically praising how it conveyed intimacy and product benefit with subtlety while working around the ban on any duration or efficacy claims. No independent reach, sales-lift, or brand-awareness figures were disclosed in the sources found — the confirmed outcome is critical and industry recognition, not a disclosed commercial result.
what came after
It became a case study cited across the ad industry for how a category under a hard advertising ban and a cultural taboo can still build brand meaning through adjacent, unbranded storytelling with a minimal, deferred brand reveal, rather than staying silent or going generic.
references
- [1]Ogilvy: Viatris' Make Love LastWPP, 2025wpp.com
- [2]Pharma Lions: WPP's Ogilvy and VML Fill Up Their CabinetsCreative Salon, 2025creative.salon