Toys R Us is the first company to use OpenAI’s generative video platform Sora to produce a commercial, or what is being described as a “brand film.” With a running time of 1:06, the spot depicts company founder Charles Lazurus as a young boy, “envisioning his dreams” for the toy store and mascot Geoffrey the Giraffe. It was co-produced and directed by Los Angeles creative agency Native Foreign co-founder Nik Kleverov, who has alpha access to the pre-release Sora. Toys R Us says that from concept to completed video, the project came together in just a few weeks to premiere at the 2024 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.

Set in the 1930s, the aim was “to capture that nostalgic feeling and deliver it uniquely to Toys R Us kids of all ages,” said Toys R Us CMO Kim Miller Olko, who executive produced as president of the company’s Toys R Us Studios.

The spot closes with a reference to the company’s partnership with Macy’s, which started as an online arrangement and in 2022 expanded to holiday season pop-up stores in all physical locations. Toys R Us filed for chapter 11 in 2017 and has since 2021 been owned by brand management firm WHP Global.

“Though OpenAI has reportedly been pitching Hollywood on the [Sora] tech, one of the first entities to publicly bite is brand management firm WHP Global, which currently licenses the Toys R Us brand to stores like Macy’s and is also exploring larger stores,” reports The Verge, noting that the spot can be seen at ToysRUs.com.

The Verge also points out that while Toys R Us claims to have “used” Sora to produce the minute-plus clip, it doesn’t claim it was entirely generated by AI, writing that Kleverov said Sora “got us about 80-85 percent of the way there.”

In February, OpenAI released Sora to a few hand-picked creators. The tool uses text and image prompts to generate video.

Since then, it has expanded access to additional filmmakers “and premiered five short films entirely made using Sora during the 2024 Tribeca Film Festival in June,” VentureBeat writes, adding that the OpenAI video generator was also used to make an indie music video that debuted online last month.

“Of course, OpenAI is far from the only company making AI-generated videos a reality,” explains VentureBeat, noting that “Runway demoed the next generation of its video model Gen-3 Alpha, which can make 10-second video clips, and Luma AI, Kling, and Pika Labs are all offering text-to-video AI models for public use, despite concerns that these models may have violated copyright by training on copyrighted video clips without permission, consent, or payment.”

Related:
All-AI Ad from Toys R Us Inspires Debate Over the Future of Marketing, The Wall Street Journal, 6/28/24