– By Doug Shields
Voice-over king, Redd Pepper, has insured his vocal cords for £10million.
Barbados-born Pepper, 57, is the man whose raspy bass-like tones have graced film trailers for more than two decades.
But he has finally stepped in front of the camera to star in the online teaser for Compare The Market’s latest rewards offering, Meerkat Meals, a brand-new bespoke dining reward powered by tastecard.
The £10 million cover protects his vocal cords in the event of ‘accidental damage’ which would leave him unable to utter his chilling, but best-known line: ‘There was a time ….. ‘.
Redd, who has voiced trailers for Armageddon, The Blair Witch Project and The Mr Bean movie among others, said: ‘’It was something I needed to do.
‘’It means I am covered if I am involved in an accident or if I am for any reason unable to use my vocal cords.
’’My voice is my career, I wouldn’t know what to do if I wasn’t able to do voice-overs.’’
Father of six, Redd was talking at the launch of a hilarious video created to kick off Meerkat Meals.
Within the 90 second video, Redd attempts to announce the launch of Meerkat Meals as “coming soon”, however his desire to ramp up the drama gets in the way of the facts leaving the exasperated sound engineer to correct Redd’s constant slip-ups.
Redd also revealed despite have a full diary, there is one character he always yearned to voice, but never has the opportunity – Optimus Prime.
He added: ‘’I could be an amazing Optimus Prime, but a guy called Peter Cullen does him, and he is fantastic at it, so I will never get that gig.’’
Redd also told how he is best friends with a celeb whose voice is the polar opposite of his gravelly-tone, Joe Pasquali.
The pair live close to each other in Kent and regularly get-together for coffee.
Redd said: ‘’People who sit close to us always give us strange looks. You couldn’t get two voices which are more different from each other.
‘’I always take the mickey out of Joe’s voice. He loves it. He is a great guy and we’ve been friends for years.’’
Starting in July, the scheme will reward customers with 2-for-1 meals at thousands of restaurants up and down the country for an entire year.
Compare The Market’s customers who buy a qualifying insurance product will be able to dine out as many times as they like for breakfast, lunch and dinner from Sunday to Thursday for a year.
Redd said: ‘’We had great fun shooting the Meerkat Meals video.’’
Julie Daniels, Director of Customer Rewards & Partnership at Compare The Market said: “We’re very excited to launch our most ambitious rewards scheme to date.
‘’Dining out with friends and family is a special occasion and we hope that our offer will see millions of people head out to take advantage of the fantastic range of restaurants on offer.
‘’Big chains and local restaurants alike can also benefit from increased footfall earlier in the week as well as larger group bookings.
“We’ve already secured some fabulous restaurants up and down the country and look forward to hearing from others who want to get involved ahead of July’s launch.
‘’Meerkat Meals reinforces our leading commitment to rewarding our customers with exceptional entertaining and value-driven benefits.
‘’We believe it will be a real game-changer for the hospitality industry and can’t wait to roll the offer out in July, which customers will receive in addition to our continuing Meerkat Movies reward.”
By presenting their unique membership details via the Meerkat app at the point of payment, up to six diners can benefit from 2-for-1 on starters, mains and desserts each visit.
Participating restaurants include some of the UK’s best loved eateries such as Pizza Hut Restaurants, Prezzo, Giraffe, Ask, Zizzi, Handmade Burger Co and Strada, as well over a thousand of independents up and down the country.
Any Compare The Market customer that purchases a qualifying product from today will receive Meerkat Meals when the annual rewards scheme goes live in July, in addition to the existing annual Meerkat Movies reward.
Both will be available to use through the new Meerkat app.
Over the last three years, Meerkat Movies has rewarded customers with over 10 million free cinema tickets and the app has been downloaded over three million times.
To find out more and be amongst the first to receive Meerkat Meals, go to https://www.comparethemarket.com/customer-rewards/meerkat-meals/
ENDS
