Fifteen Ideas

Why describe how Time Out Shanghai can introduce people to all that Shanghai has to offer, when you can demonstrate it instead?

We left a mobile phone on a sidewalk in Shanghai for any random person to pick up. Once someone did, they received a text message: “Get in the London cab that just pulled up.” What followed was a 12-hour adventure to hotspots and hidden treasures around Shanghai – all secretly captured on video. The video reached the masses through Time Out Shanghai’s social media channels as well as an aggressive PR campaign.  

Snickers’ famous global campaign “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” creates humorous “mistakes” that are attributed to hunger. But as the campaign reached Hong Kong, we realized we didn’t need to create mistakes – they already existed. By referencing topical, real-life mistakes, we created one of Hong Kong’s most talked-about campaigns ever.

Thanks to social media, we’re more connected than ever. On a related note, saying hi to someone in real life has never felt more awkward. Even highly social cultures such as the Philippines are struggling. So on behalf of Doublemint, a brand that’s synonymous with connecting people, we built a bench in a busy park in Manila that pretty much made it impossible to NOT say hi to someone.

We all have an inner-explorer. But often, that inner-explorer is tired and just wants to stay in tonight and watch Netflix or something. 5 gum is all about coaxing that inner-explorer to come out and play. And there’s a time of the week when people are most likely to do so – on the fifth day of the week at 5pm. Each week, on Fridays at 5pm, we’re issuing a “dare” to the people of China to shed their restrained behavior and try something new. And millions are saying “yes.” (Video to come...)

Little-known fact: While 100% of us use pens, only 20% of us actually buy them. (Usually office managers and heads of households…) The rest of us? We steal them… And knowing how smooth the new Papermate Inkjoy pen writes, we figured this was about to become the most stolen pen in the world.

This unique approach used social media, print, TV, trade partner activation, and even sales team activities – and was Papermate’s most successful launch in history.

5 gum advertising has always depicted a mysterious, sci-fi world, and encouraged people to “stimulate your senses.” As the brand entered China, that sci-fi world wasn’t seen as relevant. So when we created the brand’s first work for Asia, we created a more relatable world – one with an intriguing twist.

A visit to the Art Institute of Chicago opens your eyes to the world around you. We figured the museum’s advertising should do the same thing. Hence, the Red Cube Project.

We created 500 red cubes and hid them around the city of Chicago. Each one had a URL and password for people to “register” their cubes. Once they did, they received an art project they had to complete – and the best ones would be displayed in the museum itself.

Today’s children are quite programmed – they’re overscheduled, and even their toys don’t leave much opportunity to use their imagination. So the Chicago Children’s Museum created an exhibit called “Unboxed” to encourage them to “make things up.” The exhibit was made of cardboard.

To help promote the exhibit, we didn’t create an ad campaign. We created an entire store… A toy store, that didn’t sell any toys. Instead, it sold cardboard boxes, and asked kids to use their imaginations.

This is more than just a story about an escaped-bear-turned-wingman. For the first time in Wrigley's history, the development of a global campaign was led out of China. The "Don't Wait" campaign used TV, print, and digital to entrench this iconic brand’s role as a social connector.

Doublemint, a brand that’s synonymous with connecting people, was introducing chewy mints to the China market. And it just so happens that the word “chew” in Chinese (jiao) sounds very similar to the word “hello” in Italian (ciao). Let the misunderstandings begin…

Anlene, Asia’s leading adult milk brand, created the Anlene Run, an 8-kilometre race, to encourage people to stay active. To make this year’s race the most successful yet, we created “The Race Before The Race.”  

That is, we turned the act of signing up for the race into measurable, sharable content. It was a small mechanic, yet it led to over 50,000 social impressions, and helped the race sell out in under two weeks.

Sure, Starbucks has the red cups to celebrate the holidays. But what makes the holidays most special is the same thing that makes a Starbucks special all year round – the baristas.

For the first time during the holidays, we’ve brought the Starbucks baristas out from behind the counter, to share the holiday season by doing more than making a great drink. This video became the most viewed Starbucks video in the Asia Pacific region. And before you ask, yes, those are the actual Starbucks baristas singing.

Chicago was bidding to host the 2016 Olympic Games. Some of us Chicagoans were all for the Olympics – just not in Chicago. We created a website that let the International Olympic Committee members know how we felt. The site released anonymously to two people on a Monday morning. By Monday afternoon, CNN was contacting us for interviews. Here’s my Pecha Kucha presentation of how the crazy story unfolded.

Doublemint is a brand that’s synonymous with connecting people. So it only made sense to partner with an app that connects people as well. We became the first brand to use a new scanning technology on WeChat, the world's fastest-growing social app. With this technology, we turned Doublemint's barcode into an opportunity for users to connect with others, thanks to free WiFi. 

Aleve is a pain reliever used by people who suffer from arthritis (stiffening of the joints). Instead of a traditional ad campaign, we created something that would help the audience “live better.” We created Arthriving.com (a combination of the words “arthritis” and “thriving”) to fulfill a unique need online: a site dedicated to reviewing products made for people who suffer from arthritis.

Everyone knows the Starbucks cup. What they don’t know is all the expertise and effort that goes into that cup. So we told them the story, starting with the iconic Starbucks cup, and working our way backwards. The “Cup to Bean” video became one of the brand’s most viewed videos and most buzz-generating digital efforts in the Asia-Pacific region.

When we’re not shooting each other, we Chicagoans are generally quite nice. But when winter comes, all that changes. After snowstorms, people shovel out their cars, then save their spaces with chairs, blocking their neighbors from access to street parking.

So we created Chair-Free Chicago, a movement that allowed people to declare their street a “chair-free zone.” We launched the effort on the eve of Chicago’s worst snow season in history, resulting in – I’m not making these numbers up – over a billion earned media impressions across thousands of media outlets.