Joe Fresh is Loblaws most recent effort to break out of the traditional supermarket mold, breaking into the bargain fashion market to fend off competition from retail competitors Wal-Mart.

Joseph Mimran is at the heart of it, the “dynamic force behind three of Canada’s greatest Canadian retail success stories - Alfred Sung, Club Monaco and Caban,” according to his website bio. Joe Fresh Style’s approach is to provide trendy clothes at clearance prices, through fashion retail that’s embedded in Loblaws’ existing locations. Having already worked with the Westons on their home product lines, this seems like a logical extension of the Mimran’s relationship to Loblaws — and one that’s already being recognized as a success.

With the launch of their kids’ clothing line just recently completed, Joe Fresh has recently launched a series of TV ads, reminiscent of the Old Navy format we know and love. Young, clean-cut people frolic happily in stylish clothing, while catchy-fun music plays in the background to fully drill the message into your head. Even if you don’t remember the clothes, you’re going to remember either the cute people or the addicting tune — if not both.

Pretty clearly, Loblaws is hoping to put the emphasis on the “style” of “Joe Fresh Style”, and are willing to do some inventive cross-media stuff in order to accomplish that. To wit: both of the ads in the current campaign feature simple sets, attractive models, and choreography that highlights the clothing, as usual. But, they’re both also built around songs performed by Rhonda Stakich, a Canadian singer with a couple of albums and just the right sound.

So far that isn’t so much different from any Gap commercial that you might’ve seen, where happy pretty people cavort to music you might like to hear again, if only they’d bloody tell you what it is. Maybe I haven’t looked hard enough, but my impression of the music both in the Gap/Old Navy ads and their stores is that if I didn’t already know what is was, then I wasn’t hip enough to find out — whereas, interestingly, Joe Fresh has taken a different direction.

Across two ads, they’ve had the same performer; across two ads, they’ve taken pains to highlight just who she is, and just how Canadian she is. And, most interestingly of all, they’ve made both the first and second songs from their ads freely available for download from their site. Choosing a consistent tone for an ad campaign is nothing new, but I do have to credit Loblaws for the level of cross-promotion they’ve chosen to undertake — picking happy, hip music is one thing, but using Loblaws’ reach to boost a Canadian artist (openly, if you visit the site) is entirely another.

Plus, they’re great songs. Even if you never buy anything from Joe Fresh Style (disclosure: I bought their boxer-briefs), they’re willing to give you two catchy songs, and that isn’t a bad deal at all.