Play to win, don’t play to play: launching Varo Foods’ Moinmoin product

“Play to win. Don’t play to play.” said the Managing Director of Varo Foods in amazement after first setting his eyes on the Westfield Stratford demonstration kitchen we had created for him.

It may sound like an obvious statement but sometimes it can be hard to hand over the keys to your prized brand to an experiential agency and just let them ‘get on with’ creating a sampling event.

It probably hadn't helped that we’d been planning the launch of his new Nigerian delicacy Moinmoin for nearly a year, discussing a range of different venues and events and having to cancel them as the product simply wasn't ready.

Moinmoin is a dish served at Nigerian celebrations (known as Owambe) and family recipes are a closely guarded secret handed down from generation to generation. So it’s no surprise that Nigerians are very outspoken about what makes a good Moinmoin. You can see why no one had yet dared to package it as a convenience food - there was a lot at stake. 

Getting the recipe just right and waiting for the glacial manufacturing process to complete meant that the product sampling activity just got pushed further and further back. After all this time dealing with suppliers it was evident Varo Foods’ Managing Director hadn’t realised just how professional the live sampling activity could look. 

That’s precisely why he got MotivAction involved at the outset. We would take care of the whole process, ensuring our brand ambassadors were fully briefed, that Westfield Stratford’s demonstration kitchen was bright and vibrant and most importantly that his shiny new brand was properly represented throughout the whole weekend. 

No matter the client, brand or budget, MotivAction are there to win; not simply to play.

And you know what? It all paid off. After trying our hot Moinmoin samples the Nigerian target audience couldn't believe Varo Foods had managed to create such a tasty product. During our three days at the demonstration kitchen we had sold hundreds of tins of Moinmoin, created tens of thousands of opportunities to see the brand and Varo Foods saw their social media activity increase three-fold.

It looks as though Varo Foods’ Moinmoin has all the ingredients it needs to win!

If you would like to know a little more about the sampling activity we created for Varo Foods please get in touch with me at ideas@motivaction.co.uk and I’ll happily send you a case study.

A Brand Experience Case Study: Gore-Tex demonstrate that technical clothes can look stylish

After the success of the PR launch MotivAction delivered for the Gore-Tex ® SURROUND™ Product Technology launch in January they asked us to deliver a new brand experience live event that would showcase garments featuring their Gore-Tex fabrics and treatments.

Gore-Tex has been providing waterproof and breathable membranes and finishes to clothes manufacturers such as Berghaus and North Face for many years. However, many fashion consumers don’t realise the range of cutting-edge fashion brands that feature Gore-Tex or just how ‘on-trend’ some of the styles are. Gore-Tex asked us to showcase some of these garments to fashion journalists, particularly the Japanese influenced brands, such as Bathing Ape, nanamica and Visvim, who have developed a series of very stylish clothes.

MotivAction took over the Future Gallery, a fantastic white studio space in London’s Covent Garden and produced a colourful and vibrant, modern Japanese-inspired fashion show. We created bespoke mannequins from brightly coloured Perspex which were used to showcase some of the key garments. On the walls we hung giant coloured frames at jaunty angles within which we hung branded shoes.

The focus of the day was two high impact fashion shows in the style of a photo shoot. Shot on a bright blue background, our stylish models paraded in front of the photographer and his shots were instantly projected onto the walls around the journalists.

The event created a real buzz with journalists exclaiming how much they enjoyed the brand experience and the opportunity to get close to the garments. In fact, by the following morning many bloggers (such as Hypebeast, the most read online fashion news and information outlet) and journalists had written about the clothes they had seen.

Posted by Andy Cording, Brand Experiences Account Manager

‘Tis the season to get ‘fest’-ive for brands

It comes around just once a year and there are absolutely no snow covered scenes or cherubic choristers in sight. That’s right, the summer festival music season is fast approaching. And it’s not just the world’s music fans that are gearing up to see their favourite bands. The world’s biggest brands pay good money to attend the summer festivals because they know that when music fans aren’t moshing or doing air guitar, they have a captive audience that will interact with their brand.

These days brands wishing to do their brand experience activity have so many festivals other than Glastonbury to choose from. Festival organisers have realised that festival-goers that used to enjoy them in their youth would still like to attend even though they now have children. Harvest at Jimmy’s Farm and Latitude are two great examples and many brands that target this audience benefit by creating standout brand experiences that entertain and engage them.

And don’t think that festivals are strictly the domain of trendy twenty-somethings. There are festivals aimed solely at the toddler market. Lollibop in Regents Park is a summer festival for kids under the age of 10 and features appearances Rastamouse and Peppa Pig. They even have Ministry of Sound put on a mini disco for them! Again, the brand experience or live experiential opportunities are endless.

Throw in some MotivAction brand ambassadors that are trained to engage and talk with enthusiasm and knowledge about your product and you’ll find it’s a winning combination.

So, if you want your brand adored and loved by a captive audience at this year’s summer festivals then you’ve still got time book some space. Give us a call, we’ll be happy to help.

…and the best branded world record goes to...

I stumbled across this list of world records set by some of the world's biggest brands the other day, as part of their brand communications campaigns.

At number four, in homage to one of Belgium’s most famous export:

To mark the release of The Smurfs 3D movie, Sony created Global Smurfs Day. Eleven countries, including the UK, helped set a record for 'The largest gathering of Smurfs in 24 hours', with 4891 people donning blue paint and Smurf hats for the occasion.

At number three, one of the more bizarre parties I wish I’d been invited to:

IKEA set a record for the 'Largest crayfish party', with 4967 people attending events at 19 stores in the UK and Ireland. The crayfish party is a Swedish festival to mark the start of the crayfish season and is usually accompanied by copious amounts of schnapps.

At number two, one bar bill I’m glad I didn’t pick up:

The Antique Wine Company set a record for the 'Most expensive bottle of wine'. The item in question was a standard 750ml bottle of 1811 Chateau d'Yquem, which was sold for £75,000.

And finally, my favourite:

Warner Bros created the 'Longest red carpet at a film premiere' for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2. It stretched 455m from Trafalgar Square to Leicester Square in London.

Posted by Andy Cording, Brand Experiences Account Manager

Good Brand Ambassadors are Vital to Brands

I attended a really fascinating workshop this week run by Karen, our Account Director for a major telecomms client. Our team at MotivAction are running some store openings around the UK and part of that process involves us selecting talented young brand ambassadors to be the face of our client during the launch. What was pleasing to see was a) just how bright, enthusiastic and eager our ambassadors are and b) just how much work our team puts into training them.

However, the aspect of the workshop that really stuck in my mind was Karen's talk about brands. It was a very insightful overview about the fact that a company or organisation's brand is so much more than simply their logo. She reminded them that our client’s brand is actually the way the organisation is perceived by their customers; the way the brand behaves and the things it represents. It just seemed to sum up quite nicely everything that MotivAction works so hard to achieve on behalf of its clients.

Posted by Andy Cording, Brand Experiences Account Manager

Experience This! Live Brand Experience Ideas

Here are a few of the ideas our Brand Experiences team have been looking at recently

Let It Snow - Snow Globes

We’ve been looking at alternative uses for our Snow Globes that toured the UK’s shopping centres in a brand experience campaign so successfully over the Christmas period. Ideas range from housing live challenges influenced by TV show ‘The Cube’ to creating a unique 5 minute holiday where people get to put their feet up, relax on a sunlounger and enjoy a mocktail and massage.

On the Move

Some of the latest designs for mobile marketing – from creating a front room on the high street to a focal point for newspaper distribution at festivals.

 

Green Graphics

We continue to be big fans of eco-friendly brand print solutions.


The Eco-Banner stand is a paper based banner stand that is made from recycled and 100% recyclable material and printed with environmentally friendly inks. It comes in a small box and only weighs 3kgs making it exceptionally easy to transport. When the artwork is no longer relevant, it can simply be recycled at your nearest cardboard recycling centre instead of re-shipping banner stand cartridges across the country.  

Brand sponsorship - a good live brand experience?

Having seen the best football team in the history of the world give the best football team in England a lesson on how to play, I felt I needed to voice my opinion on a brand awareness sponsorship deal announced late last year by Barcelona football club.

It was mentioned that FCBarcelona will for the first time have a sponsor named on their shirt, ending 111 years of history. Their association with Unicef will remain, however the prominent name for next year will be The Qatar Foundation, a non profit organisation based in Qatar, home of the 2022 World Cup.

If you have a lot of money and are thinking of igniting your brand with a brand experience on the world stage can you think of a better way than spending £25 million a year on shirt sponsorship?

The biggest splash so far has been the PR around the deal. The Qatar Foundation are not on the shirt yet, however the brand awareness has risen enormously, and unfortunately not all the publicity is positive. The Mail Online reported that allegedly the Qatar Foundation has given money to a cleric who advocates terrorism, wife beating and anti semitism.

Not all publicity is good publicity when it comes to brand experiences and brand awareness.A successful 'Brand Experience' is not necessarily the one that captures the headlines it is the one that touches positively the people to whom it is targeted.

FC Barcelona sells around 1.2 million shirts a year, over 5 years that's 6 million shirts. If we say that at least 5 people not wearing a shirt will see someone wearing a shirt, the cost per person to the Qatar Foundation for that brand marketing is only £4.13 per person. That's not bad business. I wonder what they intend to do with this new awareness?

By Peter Lindsay