Leeds-based integrated agency, Brass, has delivered a six figure campaign to raise awareness of innovative stain-proof fabric company Aquaclean within the UK.

With Aquaclean being completely unknown to the UK market, and boasting some strong claims to being completely stain resistant, Brass were tasked with raising brand awareness and creating a campaign that would make people ask for Aquaclean in store when next buying a sofa.

The ‘Kid Kafé’ campaign was designed to celebrate the very essence of the brand, rooted in the notion that Aquaclean is a tool to ‘lifeproof’ your sofa and inspired to showcase this through the eyes of those who truly live a worry free life – kids.

The integrated campaign was delivered through a one day event to launch the first ever Kid Kafé, a café ran entirely by kids. This resulted in the opportunity to create content for multi-channel use that would resonate with Aquaclean’s target audience.

An extensive paid media and influencer campaign utilising the content created at the shoot lead to over 12m media impressions, and a reach of over 235,000 with targeted influencer audiences. The campaign also saw an upward trend in brand searches and 7.7k direct website visits as a result.

Lucy Baird, Head of PR at Brass, said: “With UK awareness being a core objective it was imperative our content worked hard to engage our key audience. We are incredibly pleased with the results generated through the campaign, and what’s more, feedback from John Lewis confirmed that they had seen a 24% YOY uplift in Aquaclean sales following the campaign.

Javier Miro, Marketing Communications Manager at Aquaclean, said: “Working with Brass is a pleasure. Not only was their creative thinking second-to-none, but their strategic approach, insight, planning and delivery went off without a hitch. They really got to grips with Aquaclean as a brand and our audience. The results speak for themselves.”

The full Kid Kafé video can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyIzPJZRHS0

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Lucozade and TBK Group collected the trophies for Brand Owner of the Year, Agency of the Year and the coveted Grand Prix Award at The IPM Awards 2018 last night, the biggest networking event of the promotional marketing industry year.

This year’s winners, which were announced at the IPM’s black-tie Awards Gala on Thursday 14th June at the London Hilton Park Lane, showcased and celebrated the very best in creativity and effectiveness in the promotional marketing industry.

The evening commenced with opening addresses from Lord Black of Brentwood, President of the IPM, and John Sylvester, the IPM’s Chairman and Chairman of Sodexo Benefits & Reward Services UK, while the host for the event was comedy superstar, Russell Kane.

Lucozade was named as Brand Owner of the Year, after campaigns for sub-brands Lucozade Sport, Lucozade Energy and Lucozade Zero collected five Gold awards, three Silvers and the Grand Prix (for Lucozade Energy’s ‘Unstoppable Bottle’ campaign).

The Grand Prix is chosen from all of the Gold winners in the IPM Awards 2018 by a Final Judging Panel. The winner is selected by anonymous vote, and this year the vote went to the ‘Unstoppable Bottle’ campaign.

All of the Lucozade trophies were for campaigns created by agency TBK Group, which also took two more Silver trophies for the ‘£10 million Giveaway for Carphone Warehouse – this haul cemented the title of Agency of the Year 2018.

Other agencies taking away multiple trophies from the IPM Awards 2018 include Savvy Marketing (five Golds and three Bronzes), ZEAL Creative (five Golds, two Silvers and four Bronzes), Leith Links (three Golds and two Silvers) and Brass (two Golds and a Bronze).

The full list of winners is on the IPM website, and you can click here to download the Winners’ Book for the IPM Awards 2018.

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Agile start-ups are subverting the grocery aisles – older brands must learn their tricks to stay ahead of them, says Sam Bannister of Brass Agency

You only have to explore a few aisles of a supermarket to see that we’re in a golden age for ‘challenger brands’ – the fast-moving, agile start-up brands that are changing the norms of grocery shopping. From Fever Tree in drinks, passing by Propercorn in snacking, Freaks of Nature in chilled and Halo Top in frozen.

Even the trip to the supermarket itself is being challenged, if we think about brands like HelloFresh and Gousto.

But how is this possible? How can these young companies, often crowd-funded and with limited budget, take on the might of established FMCG companies? We believe three factors play a key role in this disruption:

An intuitive sense of consumer needs and trends.

These new challenger brands are often created in response to a specific gap in the market and, as such, often exploit a new and burgeoning demand from consumers. Be that healthy, local, artisan, or free from, they find a void and fill it quickly, benefiting from being first to market. Part of the joy of shopping is discovering a new brand that better meets your needs. Sainsbury’s are playing back this sentiment with news that more help will be given to help incubate start-ups, including listings, mentoring, free Nectar data, and even equity for exclusivity.

The ability to be agile.

Not constrained by large estates, legacy systems and (dare we say it) bureaucracy, challenger brands have the ability to be much more flexible and entrepreneurial in the way they operate. Whether this is product innovation or packaging design, they implement change in a fraction of the time that a more established brand may be able to.

A mastery of marketing direct to consumer.

Quick to embrace digital-first, challengers are often bold and creative in their marketing. Not afraid to experiment with guerrilla tactics and social media channels to shout about how well they understand consumers and, in turn, build a strong connection.

So that’s it, then? If your brand has been around a while, it’s doomed? Well, we’d argue that this is very much not the case. All of this artisanal craftsmanship and soy-replacement has to be balanced out with something else, right? Heritage brands possess attributes that don’t come easily to challenger brands:

Familiarity

Status to a large audience – heritage brands often have latent awareness, and media spend may be more effectively deployed to reach a mass audience

Inherited affinity

Whether it is inherited from parents or siblings, or recommended by friends and colleagues, heritage brands that consumers ‘grow up’ with are very often adopted into their adult households

Emotional attachment

It might be the jingle. Maybe it’s the smell. It might even just be that you’ve seen the brand on almost every single trip to a supermarket. Heritage brands have the ability to stir powerful consumer emotion through nostalgia.

The goodwill of heritage itself

Being around for a long time can carry weight. It suggests a brand has stood the test of time, consistently delivering quality and consistency… an elevated status. This can be very powerful if used correctly, particularly in categories where purchase frequency is low.

So what does this mean for heritage brands?

In short, there isn’t a ‘one size fits all’ solution for a heritage brand to remain contemporary and relevant. But it’s imperative that they are dynamic in their marketing, and here are some pointers for thought:

• Don’t disregard what your brand has done well for so long; but at the same time learn from what the challengers are doing well
• Place the consumer at the heart of your brand. Gain insight from them, and use it to your advantage
• Understand not just current trends in the marketplace, but also what the future might look like – where next?
• Innovate, innovate, innovate. In product, flavour, packaging and marketing.
• Reflect the excitement that consumers have been trained to expect, but do it in your own way
• Be bold, and challenge the norms. In outward communication with consumer, but also through internal practices
• Innovate some more!

Sam Bannister is Head of Insight at Brass Agency. Brass is a multi-award-winning full-service marketing agency with expertise in strategic thinking and delivery and specialist skills in digital, advertising, design, PR, SEO, media, shopper, consumer insights and promotional marketing. Clients include Coty, Lucozade Ribena Suntory, Perrigo and Burton’s Biscuits. This comment originally appeared on Brass’ website.

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Burton’s Biscuit Company has launched its biggest ever promotional marketing campaign for its Fish ‘n’ Chips savoury snack brand, with an on-pack prize promotion with a £1m prize fund.

The ‘Join Our Fans’ campaign, created by Brass Shopper, part of Leeds-based full-service, communications agency Brass, will run for 12 weeks and is being supported by social content, outdoor advertising, in-store activation and PR.

‘Join Our Fans’ offers shoppers the chance to win one of 20,000 £50 Ticketmaster Gift Cards to spend on the event or activity or their choice.  Entry is via codes found on promotional packs. Shoppers will also be entered into a draw to win one of three ultimate fan experiences, where the winners will get to create and tailor their own perfect fan experience prize up to the value of £2,500.

The campaign went live in April and will be on shelves until the end June 2017.

Paul McGann, Managing Partner at Brass, says: “In a hugely competitive category, ‘Join Our Fans’ has huge standout; building on the brand’s quirky tone of voice and loyal following, adding value and engaging a wider range of shoppers.”

In addition to creating and delivering the on-pack promotion, Brass also created and executed all key campaign elements including the supporting campaign microsite, www.joinourfans.com, where shoppers can enter the promotion and upload their own fan stories.  Brass will also be managing the social creative content for the 12-week campaign period.

Sital Parmar, Senior Marketing Manager at Burtons Biscuit Company, comments: “These are exciting times for the Fish ‘n’ Chips brand as we look to continue to build on the phenomenal growth we’ve seen since our re-introduction in 2014. We’re confident ‘Join our Fans’ will drive rate of sale for retailers, reward our existing fans and drive household penetration.”

Burton’s Biscuit Company is a leading branded and own-label supplier of quality biscuits and snacks and one of the largest biscuit suppliers in the UK.  It owns and bakes market-leading brands such as Maryland Cookies, Jammie Dodgers, Wagon Wheels and Fish ‘n’ Chips.

Brass Shopper is part of Brass, a full-service, communications agency based in Leeds with clients including ASDA, Kellogg’s, Ribena, Costcutter and Aunt Bessie’s.

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Leading fast-fashion retail brand New Look has launched its new Autumn/Winter 2016 promotional campaign online and across more than 600 retail stores in the UK and republic of Ireland, offering consumers £1m of style prizes to be won.

Created by Brass, New Look’s recently appointed shopper and promotional marketing agency, the campaign encourages customers to ‘Shop Styles, Get Prizes’.

Brass’ dedicated shopper marketing team created and delivered a campaign to help New Look engage with savvy shoppers in-store, online and on mobile. Tasked with increasing transaction levels, Brass developed a marketing campaign prompting customers spending £30 or more to photograph their receipt and upload, email or text to receive a promotional code.

Brass also created in-store POS and built the promotional website, allowing customers to enter for a chance to win some great prizes from one of three different prize ‘worlds’; Fashion, Fun and Getaways.  Entrants not winning a main prize will still receive a 25% off voucher.

In order to provide a robust proof of purchase mechanic without the need for ePOS integration, Brass partnered with receipt processing specialists Snipp Interactive to validate the photographed receipts.

Nicky Haddow, New Look Senior Trading Manager UK & ROI, commented: “Brass impressed us with an innovative digital concept which shows real insight into our target customers shopping habits and behaviours. We believe this proposition will give great stand out for peak trading this year.”

Brass Managing Partner Paul McGann added: “In a fiercely competitive fashion market, the new stylish multi-channel campaign for New Look has huge standout, adding value and engaging a wide range of shoppers.”

Brass is a full-service integrated marketing agency combining digital thinking and delivery with specialist skills in advertising, design, PR, SEO, media, shopper and promotional marketing. Brass has created Shopper Marketing promotional campaigns for brands such as Haribo and Kellogg’s and recently won Masters of Marketing, IPM and FAB Gold awards for their ‘Meet the Minions’ campaign for Soreen. The Leeds-based agency also ranked fourth in the 2016 Independent Agencies Census Elite list and was recently shortlisted for the CIM Northern Awards.

New Look is a British global fashion retailer with a chain of over 1,000 high street shops across the world including in the UK, Republic of Ireland, Europe, Middle East, Singapore, Russia and Poland. It also ships to over 120 countries world-wide. New Look is currently the second largest women’s fashion retailer by value in the UK with 44% of the female population having shopped at its stores over the last year.

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Leeds Rhinos Foundation, the charity set up by rugby league club Leeds Rhinos, has launched a film that showcases the work going on under the foundation’s ‘Changing Lives Through Sport’ philosophy.

The film, created by Leeds-based agency, Brass, stars Leeds Rhinos player and Foundation trustee Jamie Jones-Buchanan. It captures how the lives of children and adults in deprived communities across Leeds have been enriched through sport.

Shot at four different locations across the city, to reflect the Charity’s wide variety of work, the 136 second film shows the Foundation inspiring young people in local schools as well as working with Specialist Inclusive Learning Centres and TryZone Education Centre to improve the lives of adult learners and those with disabilities.

Dr. Neil Kaiper-Holmes, chairman of the Leeds Rhinos Foundation board of trustees, says: “It has been a long held ambition to have a top quality product that vividly describes what the Foundation is all about. But the costs of production have always been prohibitive for a relatively small charity such as ours, with a turnover of less than a million pounds a year. Thanks to the generosity of in-kind sponsors Brass and Mob Sport, we now have a vehicle to enable us to attract and inform even more sponsors and donors.”

Following an exclusive premier of the film on Wednesday 21st October at an event to celebrate the Foundation’s tenth anniversary, the charity’s strategy to connect emotionally to a new audience continues through adverts, exhibition banners, social media assets, photography kits and a video pack. All this has been created by Brass to help the Foundation raise awareness of its achievements and attract new sponsors.

Since being founded in 2005, the award-winning charity now works with an estimated 50,000 people a year under its five focus pillars of Education, Health, Sport, Art and Heritage.

Brass is a full-service, communications agency which offers digital, research, advertising, design, PR, SEO, media, shopper and promotional marketing to a range of local and national clients. In June, the agency won an IPM Gold Award for its work on the digital element of Lucozade Ribena Suntory’s Lucozade Sports Conditions Zone campaign for the isotonic sports drink.

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