AD WATCH: From grey suits to space-suits at Norwich Union

It is most advertising agencies' worst nightmare: how to create a sexy financial services campaign? Consumers just aren't interested, you see. The products are complicated and the advertising typically dull and dry. Step forward and take a bow, then, Norwich Union which has bravely recruited a comedy chef and an elusive lobster to star in its latest TV campaign.

"Seriously distracting" is the theme, with each ad depicting situations in which protagonists are "seriously distracted" by the prospects of Norwich Union's flotation. That's where the lobster comes in - he escapes from the chef's kitchen and is last seen reading a newspaper on a train. Laboured? Maybe. Corny? Perhaps. But it's an approach which is little short of revolutionary in the grey-suited world of financial services.

"If you're unable to say something concrete - which is the case with many financial ads - creating interesting and effective advertising becomes far harder," says Marilyn Baxter, vice chairman of the agency behind the campaign, Saatchi and Saatchi. It's all very well saying "cheaper", "faster" or "washes whiter" for other products, but the true value of a pension won't become evident for many years. Then there's the nature of the beast - the more complex the product, the tougher it is to explain.

The challenge was to advertise something financial, but broadcast regulations dictate that cannot be directly advertised, she adds. The Financial Services Act prevents anyone from urging consumers to buy shares because they are a good investment. It also requires ads to carry unwieldy disclaimers, including the now familiar health warning: "The value of shares/investments can go up as well as down".

The campaign, targeting NU's two million UK members, had to be a call to action - but stick within the letter of the law. And it had to stand out from the glut of recent building society demutualisations.

Building society floatations tend to involve free shares being offered to shareholders. The demutualisation of NU, however, is slightly different, says Thomas Cowper-Johnson, Norwich Union's head of brand and international communications.

"Not only is NU offering shares but it also hopes to raise new money from members offered the chance to buy more shares at a discount," he explains.

To work within the spirit of the Financial Services Act advertising and broadcast legislation, the campaign had to focus on creating awareness of the opportunity to buy. "Much financial services advertising is dull as dishwater," Mr Cowper-Johnson believes. Humour is an effective way of breaking through this - even if used in moderation (NU was looking to raise a smile rather than a "belly laugh", he explains).

That the end result retained even the merest hint of humour is little short of a miracle, given the army of advisors and censors who vetted the process. "The campaign had to meet the approval of not only the agency creative director and client but, more specifically, NU's financial director, its merchant banker, lawyers, stock brokers, city PR firm and all the interested regulatory authorities," Ms Baxter says.

Read the reams of literature associated with NU's imminent demutualisation and you too will probably will find yourself failing to catch your partner on the trapeze, missing your rocket home from outer space or boiling your lobster live - as happens in each of the ads. But the really neat touch is the campaign's lightness of tone.

It is a lesson already learned by the likes of Allied Dunbar, who's all singing and dancing "There might be trouble ahead" campaign continues to engage and entertain.

But sit up at the back, Equitable Life and Scottish Widows. The former continues to rely on the agonising father and son combo in the "It's an equitable life, Henry" ads. And the latter? You've guessed it... Scottish women dressed in black.