In this month's issue we will be highlighting the key events of: Pancake Day, Mother's Day and Easter. We'll be sharing what our in-store site visits revealed and looking at what brands and retailers we think did it best.
We're also sharing our creative Top Picks of the month. With creative campaigns, brands buddying up, rad retailer experiences and more.
PANCAKE DAY
Tesco – Flipped
Tesco’s 'Flipping Pancake Day' was this year's standout campaign. A success due to its simple, playful, and clever creative approach. The upside-down billboard cleverly mimicked flipping a pancake, making the ad instantly engaging and memorable. By listing key ingredients alongside “Tuesday,” Tesco reinforced itself as the go-to destination for picking up everything you need for Pancake Day. This creative twist sparked conversation and social media buzz, making it a standout seasonal moment that continues Tesco's recent success of stand-out OOH executions following on strongly from their recent 'ICONS' campaign.
RSPCA – Better for Hens
RSPCA Assured launched a Pancake Day campaign to raise awareness about hen welfare, encouraging shoppers to choose RSPCA Assured labelled eggs, to help support higher welfare farming standards. The campaign aims to educate shoppers on food sourcing, allowing them to make better choices when purchasing animal products.*
“UK consumers will consume approximately 52 million eggs on Pancake Day – a staggering increase of around 22 million more eggs than on any other day,” said Xenia Kingsley, senior marketing manager at RSPCA Assured... No matter how people like their pancakes, we hope the campaign will encourage people to spare a thought for the lives of hens and choose higher-welfare eggs.”**
We love this message and how it's delivered. Building awareness in a friendly, non judgemental tone, this softer approach to animal welfare advertising is likely to connect well with shoppers, who can enjoy Pancake Day guilt free.
MOTHER'S DAY
Yankee Candle – Make it Memorable
Yankee set the mood this year in Sainsbury's, owning the space at store entry with an oversized candle and a simply impactful display that highlighted them as a great gifting choice for a memorable day for Mums.
Store Placement
Supermarkets have used their front of store spaces to create shoppable areas just for Mother's Day. Moving relevant gift items into a single area, the brands that are seen within this space have a great advantage during the gifting period, being seen as valuable gifting option and easily visible, increasing the chance of pick-up, especially for last minute shoppers.
EASTER
All-out Easter
It's no surprise that walls of Easter Eggs are everywhere. We found that going big with aisle headers, single brand product and theatrical out-of-aisle displays really made brands stand out in a very busy space.
Seasonal brand offerings and smaller items like M&M's and Maltesers bunnies create more opportunity at the end of the shopper journey. We can't ignore the pulling power of promotion either, with Cadbury Creme Egg and Lindt adding value to shoppers and incentivising pick-up decisions with cash and prizes.
Milkyway
We helped our friends at Mars Wrigley to 'crack' their Asda Easter exclusive Milkyway Easter Egg, with an attention grabbing hotspot graphics which created a disruptive and theatrical on-shelf display.
M&S
The M&S understated own-brand graphics used a simple idea and executed nicely around store making it clear to navigate around. With the use of photography, graphic elements, die-cut headers and sweetly simple copy-lines, it added character and festivity to their premium space.
TOP PICKS
A Super Partnership - Nintendo & Pringles
Pringles' collaboration with Nintendo's much loved Super Mario has been a stand-out campaign for us. The campaign featuring limited-edition packaging adorned with characters like Mario and Luigi has got us picking up packs when we otherwise wouldn't, and that was before we realised there was a prize promotion going on with their mystery tube flavour challenge. The partnership 'powered up' awareness with playful billboards, OOH theatre and pop-up experiences.
B&&&Q - Prices Nailed
A simple idea executed with great impact. B&Q's refreshed campaign caught our eye as they highlight the brand’s continued positioning to offer great value across the vast range of their DIY essentials. The bold and striking OOH marketing gets across the idea effectively with the use of the repeating '&' suggests more, whilst the simple headline and accompanying prices gets across the value on offer effectively.
The Shop Experience - M&S & Tesco
On our recent store visits we've seen some interesting ways for brands and retailers to elevate experiences for shoppers.
The Entertainer brought the 'Toy Shop' to Tesco stores with an illuminating header display. It did a great job of capturing attention down an already colour-filled aisle.
M&S are elevating the shopper experience, with a beautifully designed sushi shop-in-shop, it made us hungry to explore the brands and products they had on offer.
M&S also offered up some sweet bays that got us trotting down the aisle. The colour-blocking and tidy appearance of the Percy Pig and Colin The Caterpillar aisles represents how we like to approach simple ways to use colour to create ownable branded aisles.
NEXT TIME...
We'll be exploring the world of healthy food, drink and snacks and the increased product offering in UK supermarkets.
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We hope you enjoyed our blog, finding it insightful and valuable. If there's anything you would like to see us cover in future blogs, please feel free to let us know.