David Schwimmer Stars in Quince's First Celebrity Campaign, Built Around a Red Sweater

Quince, the clothing company, has launched its first celebrity campaign, and the face of it is David Schwimmer, who played Ross Geller in the sitcom Friends. The campaign promotes a cashmere sweater, a soft fine wool, in a new colour called Coulis Red.

The centrepiece is a 60-second film titled "The Red Sweater". Schwimmer plays himself. He chases a group of lookalikes, all wearing the red sweater, across New York. Then the sweater falls from the sky and lands in his lap. WWD reported the film's plot.

The joke is a nod to Friends. The campaign refers to the episode "The One With the Red Sweater", in which the characters try to find the owner of a red sweater. That search matters because the owner is the likely father of Rachel Green's baby. The episode reveals that owner to be Ross Geller, the role Schwimmer played.

Schwimmer said he had been buying Quince clothes long before anyone asked him to take part in a campaign. That detail gives the partnership a different starting point from many celebrity deals, where a star is paid to wear a brand they may not have used before.

The campaign appeared in an Instagram post from Quince on 6 November. Coverage of the post pointed to the Friends reference, and fans spotted the link within hours.

The film works by borrowing a storyline that viewers already know. The red sweater, the hunt and the surprise reveal all come from the original episode, and the advertisement plays on each of them. For a company selling a single sweater in a new colour, that is a simple way to make a product recognisable.

Quince has not said how much it paid Schwimmer, and no figures for the campaign's reach or sales have been released.