The ‘final mile’ for brand activation
An integral part of the services we offer at Freemans Event Partners is what we term brand partnerships. What this means in practice is supporting our venue clients in activating their sponsorship agreements with brands during an event. Or in some cases, working with a single brand at multiple events. It’s about becoming the link between the sponsor and the public.
We sometimes describe what we do as the ‘final mile’ for brands at an event – their brand in our hands, if you like!
Here are some of the recent projects we have supported brand clients with…
Helping Brothers Cider ‘own’ Halloween
This brand partnership ensured Brothers Cider made its mark at the We Are Halloween FSTVL at Hainault Forest Country Park.
As the official Cider Partner of the event, with pouring rights across the site, our role was to encourage consumers to engage in and participate with a number of Halloween themed activities.
The target audience was 18–25-year-old millennials. So, we designed and created a ‘Curious Tree’, photo wall, glitter coffin with peep board and pumpkin cart to inject some fun and intrigue and encourage visitors to record content which they would then share on their social media channels. All while sampling Brothers Cider’s new flavours!
With many festivalgoers dressing up for the event, the interactive Halloween-themed elements really caught their imagination. A zombie parade passing by the bar also drew a fair amount of attention!
During the activation, over 800 cold and 400 hot samples were consumed with pendants and goody bags given out. This helped to amplify the brand across the site.
What’s more, the activation included posts across social media using the hashtags #WeAreHalloween and #BrothersCider to broadcast messages about the promotion, while resharing user generated content from influencers and festivalgoers.
Celebrating 10 years of ‘letting your random side out’
Rowntrees’ brief to us was to increase exposure of their Randoms brand amongst a millennial audience in a festival environment, whilst celebrating 10 years since they were first launched. The accompanying message focussed on ‘letting your random side out’– a key factor in the planning of this activation.
The timing was perfect for Victorious Festival, based in Portsmouth over the August Bank holiday. The popular festival has a millennial audience too, making it a perfect fit for the product.
With an enthusiastic sampling team, an array of fancy dress and a target of 60,000 sampling packs to hand out over 3 days, our team hit the ground running.
Location was key and we were in the perfect spot to maximise on footfall, between two bars and opposite the main stage. For the chance to win a year’s supply of Randoms, festival goers dived into the bin of fancy dress and posed for pictures in the selfie frame, tagging #letyourrandomsideout on social media.
Car Park Party and Coca Cola
With Covid-19 pushing the pause button on all in-door activities for more than a year, the brand partnership with Car Park Party on its Billionaire Boy and Horrible Histories Tour and Coca-Cola, presented an opportunity for a rare ‘in person’ experience and a platform to amplify the soft drinks giant’s recycling campaign.
The Car Park Party tour was an outdoor, drive-in style event, where families could interact with the live performance of David Walliams’, Billionaire Boy using horns and car lights. The tour was set to cover locations across the country delivering Coca-Cola’s recycling message far and wide in a memorable fashion.
With our staff, the cast, crew and general public adhering to strict Covid guidelines, visitors could begin to experience the joy of a live event once more with confidence.
In the lead-up to Car Park Party, Coca-Cola’s key recycling messages were broadcast through social media posts and email campaigns reaching a database of 65,000 people.
The partnership delivered:
- Site space for experiential recycling area at events
- Branding across all digital platforms (website, social media and email)
- Coca-Cola products sold at each event
- Goodie bags
- Digital screen content shown before and after each showing
- Questions included within a pre-event quiz for visitors
- Branding within menus that were distributed to every car at each event
The tour had an incredible reach, covering 69 shows, 22 venues, 20,000 cars and 70,000 customers.
The brand partnership with Car Park Party and Coca-Cola gave the companies involved an opportunity deliver something memorable and spread a bit of cheer during a difficult time for all. And provided a rare opportunity for brand activation in a live event setting.
