adidas Westfield Stratford store launch

Our objective was to build awareness that there is a new adidas store within the new Westfield Stratford City supermall. Once we’d built awareness, we were tasked to drive sales and footfall in-store, and to encourage repeat purchase.

We knew that the target audience is notoriously hard to build credibility with. We therefore recruited 10 adidas Originals ambassadors, who walked the walk and talked the talk, speaking to our audience in areas within an easy commute of the new supermall, and in hubs where they congregate. We also recruited the ultimate Originals ambassador – the street magician Dynamo.

BlackBerry Messenger gave us the perfect platform and the agility with which to facilitate all of the above, broadcasting prizes and teasers to the audience at various stages across the promotional period.

There was a 31% response rate from those added to the BBM group competition that then went into the store. 7,500 contacts were generated over a five-day period (out of store). The sales target was hit within four days (three days ahead of our KPI target). Twitter and Facebook amplification reached more than 300,000 contacts.

Closer launch secret pop-up restaurant to launch Morrisons M Kitchen range

Morrisons has unveiled a unique foodie partnership with five of the UK’s leading chefs. Bryn Williams, Nigel Haworth, Aldo Zilli, Atul Kochhar and Pierre Koffmann have worked with Morrisons on part of the rebrand of its meal solutions range, M Kitchen.

Working alongside Morrisons own culinary experts, the professional chefs each created an exclusive recipe for the M Kitchen range. To launch Closer created an unbranded pop-up bistro just off Regent Street, fronted by the five chefs, called The Kitchen.  Here, diners were served the dishes, unknown to them that it was straight from a packet.  At the end of the meal, once diners had given feedback, Morrisons revealed it was behind the venture, proving that it’s possible to produce restaurant-quality meals in an instant.  The pop-up will be open until 13th October 2011.

These dishes are a small part of the newly launched M Kitchen range which includes 300 restaurant quality meals to enjoy at home. As a nation, we eat £3.3 billion worth of ready meals every year, with 75% of consumers admitting that they see ready meals as the more affordable alternative to a takeaway or dining out

Neil Nugent, Executive Chef at Morrisons, commented:  “The Kitchen has been an incredible experiment with 81% of diners saying that would pay more than £30 for their food and 81% rating it as ‘excellent’. We’ve achieved our goal to demonstrate that you can have restaurant quality food to enjoy easily at home. The new M Kitchen range only uses the highest-quality ingredients, authentic cooking methods and gourmet recipes. With this philosophy in mind, we worked with Pierre, Bryn, Nigel, Aldo and Atul to add their own exquisite touches to five dishes.

Introducing live media

Today’s consumers are hyper-connected multi-taskers who embrace the digital world and adopt a ‘sit back’ attitude when bombarded with messages. This means that communication channels are increasingly non-linear and the path to purchase is blurred. So, get them…or get lost!

So, how do we evolve experiential marketing disciplines and explore broader engagement platforms to speed up the purchasing cycle, influence attitudinal and behavioural change, and ultimately get consumers to ‘sit forward’?

Take a look at some of our recent campaigns which transcend standalone experiential activity by incorporating digital, social media, mobile and ambient channels.

Fun and engaging brand experiences

Pot Noodle, owned by Unilever, wanted to connect with 16-24 yr old males in an engaging way that would ‘shock Daily Mail readers’.

Our ISP Gold award winning idea and strategy, saw actors challenge consumers to a themed pugal contest in exchange for prizes and bragging rights.

Visiting key UK festivals including Rip Curl Boardmasters, all ‘fights’ were filmed and emailed back to participants so that they could share their content with social networking sites.

157,000 samples were distributed and 978 participants received an edit of their fight. Word of mouth reached 800,000 mentions and on-line brand affinity scored 96% when linking positive keywords to the brand.

Driving acquisition through relevant brand experiences

To bring the Barclaycard positioning of ‘One Step Ahead’ to life and make it relevant to younger consumers, we produced a giant urban structure that showcased the growing sport of Free Running and owned Jubilee Gardens, South Bank for the weekend.

Working with global athletes and artists, we provided a free flowing show demonstrating skills, tricks, and performances high above the crowds in combination with DJ’s, presenters, MC’s and vocal beat-boxers. Dummy Barclaycards were distributed to capture data and also offered consumers a complimentary drink through Coffee Republic. 75,000 consumers saw the live activity, 25,000 redeemed their free coffee and 23,000 acquisition telephone follow ups were made.

Influencing consumer behaviour and disturbing routines

With more than 1.5 million journeys in just over three months of operation, the Mayor, Barclays and Transport for London (TfL) have silenced their critics. Within central London, 8,000 bicycles across 14,400 docking stations are helping Londoners get active.

Working closely with Transport for London, we encouraged urbanites to overcome their city cycling fears, get on their bikes, and to ‘Sign Up, Saddle Up and Set Off’. We are activating 45 key events throughout the year to raise awareness of the scheme and its expansion into 2012.

Finding ways to engage with specific audiences

Challenged to influence children’s eating behaviour, the Flora Schools programme put healthy eating at the heart of primary school classrooms.

We created “Seeds TV”, a touring interactive roadshow that educated children on the benefits of eating a well-balanced diet and getting hands-on with healthy ingredients, including making scones. 130 schools were visited with 15,000 children experiencing the activity and more than 15,000 DVDs distributed for future use.

User-generated content led experiences

Adidas set us the challenge to engage with a specific audience and generate content that would extend the promotional window beyond the face-to-face interaction and drive awareness of their partnership with the UEFA Champions League.

Our giant replica football  was kitted out like a stadium and toured the UK inviting 10-14- year-olds to prove they’re worthy of the honour of being an Official UEFA Champions League Ball Carrier by performing football skills.

Performances were filmed and put on a dedicated YouTube page, so that the young fans could view their clips and pass them on to friends and family, to rate their favourites. The campaign reached 800,000 consumers off- and online.

Delivering innovative experiences to a targeted audience

Closer created a theatrical roadshow to raise awareness and encourage trial of Pot Noodle’s new Oriental flavour: ‘Mr Chu’s Golden Noodle No. 7 Sticky Rib’.

The activity targeted 16- to 24-year-olds, who were invited to compete in Mr Chu’s ‘Sticky Rib Challenge’, an inflatable bungee-run experience, as well as trying the brand-new tasty flavour at events such as Boardmasters in Newquay and Matthew Street Festival in Liverpool.

To date, 150,000 wet and dry samples have been distributed.

Branded high-footfall events at iconic locations

The Panasonic ‘2012 Two years to go’ event, held at Trafalgar Square, brought together Capital FM radio (Jonny, Lisa, Roberto and Luke), the Flawless dance troupe, a Panasonic 3D zone, appearances by Olympians and LOCOG officials, and a photo call with the 2012 mascot, Wenlock.

This high-profile, one-day event was streamed onto a 60sqm screen in real-time. A huge success, it saw Closer managing approximately 200 event personnel with more than 50,000 consumers in attendance.