Umbro /
England Kit Launch 2009
This truly contemporary campaign, underpinned by an influencer seeding strategy has seen great success and even won us an award.
Infiltrating a new audience whilst not alienating the existing was the core challenge with the launch of the new England Football kit in early 2009. Taking this icon of English football, which had undergone a complete re-design to being an icon of English culture allowed us to re-define the replica shirt whilst saying something bigger about football as part on English culture. Historically, launching an England kit has been simple and formulaic, but we knew that if it were to truly infiltrate new audiences, credibly and effectively, it required a non-traditional approach. All this was set against a recession landscape at the same time as Umbro increasing the price of an England shirt.
We created an integrated campaign that was underpinned by an influencer seeding strategy and saw us reach out to a powerful network of global opinion formers. The campaign was designed to create content and assets, pre, during and post launch that would drive reappraisal and fame. A bespoke built multi purpose ‘energy space’ was at the core of the campaign offering a platform to showcase and retail the new kit exclusively. Further to this we created iconic shots of John Terry and Wayne Rooney and offered these to selected titles as media exclusives. We also partnered with Vice Magazine, Konami and Facebook to bring together some of the UK’s hottest up and coming creative talent and spread the word via exclusive content and competitions seeded out to key sites, blogs and networks.
Results:
All in all a truly successful Award Winning campaign that has initiated a shift in positioning and perception of Umbro within new audiences. £3 million worth of coverage was delivered in 3 months. 28 million adults (58% of the population) were reached 7 times delivering a solid platform on which to build in the run up to, throughout and beyond the 2010 World Cup. 20,000 shirts were sold in the first 24 hours
Martini /
Stay Beautiful
Martini wanted to change consumer’s perceptions of the brand amongst 25-35 year old women. So we took them to the places this iconic brand should be and made it fashionable again.
Martini briefed us with the challenge of bringing their ‘Stay Beautiful’ campaign to life in a BTL environment. The emphasis was to actively change perceptions of the brand amongst the female 25-35 years audience, to promote the low abv of the drinks and the new Rosato variant.
We recognised that the key to changing perceptions was to offer opportunities to trial in relevant environments. Our activity was designed to deliver trial across event, on trade and partnership platforms.
We created an experiential space which was taken to fashion and style destinations popular with the target audience. These included the Clothes Show in London, Westfield and designer fashion shows during London Fashion Week.
The space was a modern interpretation of the historical Martini Terrazza’s. The focal point was the bar, with the new Rosato variant glorified as a backdrop. The ‘Stay Beautiful’ concept was bought to life via complementary beauty treatments and mini manicures for consumers as they enjoyed their samples.
Within the on trade, Martini created a squadra of staff to visit over 200 outlets across the UK. The team sampled the new Rosato variant to consumers, whilst also incentivising further purchase with promotional activity. On trade collateral and kits were also created, utilising impactful reflective surfaces to maximise standout in a crowded environment.
The partnerships created in 2009 with Toni&Guy and Nails Inc. were chosen due to their relevance to the target audience, and also to maximise reach of samples across the UK within their high street salons.
In total over 60,000 samples were distributed across events, on trade and partnership activity. There was a 20% conversion from trial to purchase in the on trade and over 36,000 people were driven to a dedicated Facebook page (8,000 fan sign ups).
Rizla /
Invisible Players
With music as a brand platform we devised an innovative strategy that got Rizla to the heart of the action of the summer’s hottest events, tackling dark marketing issues and turning customers into fans.
Our brief was to produce a campaign that engaged a core 18 – 34 Male/Female audience with the Rizla brand and its products whilst understanding an increasingly challenging market with restrictive legislation. At the same time we needed to enhance brand equity amongst young adults, drive brand reappraisal and create truly engaging and memorable touchpoints that turn customers into ‘adorers’.
Using music as a brand platform, we created the Rizla Invisible Players, a long-term strategic overarching campaign theme that offers a platform for the brand to engage face to face with their audience.
At the core of this campaign is the Rizla Invisible Players festival arena. A subtly branded open air arena that delves into Rizla’s heritage and has recreated a custom vehicle that Rizla used in the 1920’s as a touring musical experience. This experience tours selected festivals and is further amplified and supported by a nationwide club tour. Content is key in this campaign, this allows us to amplify key messages via a dedicated area on rizla.co.uk whilst acquiring press coverage in relevant titles.
Now moving into year four and growing, this campaign tackles the issues surrounding the marketing of tobacco products credibly and effectively. Since 2006 this activity developed into a widely adored, famous and valuable campaign that delivers coverage and cut through to the media savvy audience.
De Beers /
Forevermark
The creation of a global communications blueprint for DeBeers Diamonds saw us roll out their new Forevermark brand. Designed to lay the foundations for ensuring it became a universal and global brand in its own right.
Forevermark is a marque launched by De Beers in 2008, which assures consumers of the diamonds’ high standards of craftsmanship, ethicacy and provenance.
We were asked to create a global blueprint to communicate this new brand in key Asian markets including China, Hong Kong and Japan. This educative activity was designed to lay the foundations for ensuring Forevermark became a universal and global brand in its own right in the future.
Every diamond is unique and behind every jewel is a story. Using the brief ‘Precious’ we created a collection of diamond jewellery pieces and stories, in collaboration with a number of literary experts and jewellery designers.
The Precious Collection was then launched at events in each territory, to which media and local celebrities were invited. The collection, the authors and designers provided visual content and personality to bring the brand to life in media.
A toolkit and media kit was created for translation and distribution in markets, along with event and media guidelines.
Over $1 million of editorial was generated.
Vitaminwater /
UK Brand Launch
Vitaminwater chose us to launch their brand into the UK and we responded by generating a buzz through an extensive campaign of events, sampling and product placement. Our innovative campaign was so successful it is being applied to the brand’s launch throughout the rest of Europe.
Vitaminwater is more than just a flavoured water. Having garnered enormous success in the USA, Coca-Cola acquired the brand and wanted to replicate its brand equity driving campaign in Europe.
Positioning was everything and our task was to establish the same quickly and effectively in the UK.
This PR led initiative included a bespoke VIP card to 4000 key opinion formers, allowing them products whenever and wherever they needed. We also created a central London pop-up store for sampling and experiential activity.
The store showcased 6 products and promoted 24 hour hydration with a combination of left field content such as snail racing, helium karaoke and laughter yoga.
Activity at London Fashion Week and Glastonbury focused on celebrity ambassadors and product placement to drive fame and inspire sales.
We then launch a new flavour – XXX – Triple Berry by bringing to life ‘The Berry Light District’ a concept bar, showcasing unique content such as Right Said Fred, Jodie Harsh , Mel B and the up and coming Charlie XCX.
Virgin Unite /
Annual Charity Fundraising Ball
Over the last three years we’ve created and organised Virgin Unite’s annual charity ball. From the concept to the clear up, we managed every element of these nights that have raised £800,000 for the Virgin Unite charities.
Our three-year relationship with Virgin Unite (The charity arm of the Virgin Group) has seen us create and organise events that have utilised their fundamentals and raised both awareness and funds for the Virgin Unite charities. For the past three years Exposure has been enlisted to create an exciting, high profile ‘must attend’ annual fundraising event for Richard Branson’s charity arm of the group.
In 2008 we conjured up, ‘Through The Looking Glass’ a theme inspired by Alice In Wonderland: Mad Hatters Tea Party. We used this creative platform as it reflected Virgin Unite’s key brand values in a fun and colourful manner incorporating interactive elements, high-end entertainment and premium auction items. Our strategy saw us implement all areas of event management for the night, ranging from the organisation and design to the red carpet arrivals and the arranging of live performances from Kelly Rowland and Natalie Imbruglia. We assisted in securing sponsorship, acted as a media consultancy and negotiated reduced costs for every aspect of the evening that liberated the budget for further use.
By utilising our network we secured not only exclusive items for the charity auction but extensive post-party coverage in Hello magazine with the front page and 8 pages dedicated to our night. Each year we’ve attracted high volumes of interest and attendance, from business, celebrities and even Royalty. The results of our three Virgin Unite events have exceeding expectation with £800,000 raised for the Virgin Unite charities.