2012 aiga minnesota Design Show

Target wanted to celebrate it’s sponsorship of the 20th anniversary of the Holidazzle parade through downtown Minneapolis and leverage the timing of the event’s opening day, which occurred on Black Friday. The challenge was to breathe new life into a familiar and, at times, dated event experience. They wanted a new take that would engage consumers and get them to spend more time in a branded environment.

The inspiration behind our design solution came from looking at the entire event from a ‘larger-than-life’ perspective, much in the way a child might view the fairytales represented the parade floats, themselves. Therefore, we created a life-size interruptive environment consumers could interact with, including a branded gingerbread house complete with scented smokestack and two life-size snow globes that up to six people could get inside for a free holiday photograph.

The core strategic idea was to provide a moment of pure celebration and good will, to effectively position Target at the forefront of consumer’s minds heading into the busiest shopping weekend of the year while giving them a memory they wouldn’t soon forget.

Delivery of Work

To completely surprise attendees arriving in anticipation of the Holidazzle parade, our environment installation stood like a whimsical little winter village embedded in the middle of downtown Minneapolis, being set up the night before. The proximity of our footprint to local media channels covering the parade gained maximum exposure and remote broadcasts from within our footprint.

A white picket fence adorned with garland and bells lined the perimeter of the plaza. As people entered beneath a peppermint candy-striped archway they were immediately greeted by Target Brand Ambassadors, decked out in red winter vests with Bullseye mittens, hats and shirts.

The central focus of this winter environment was a custom, 10’x20’ life-sized gingerbread house, complete with working chimney and candy decorations. The interior of the house was outfitted to look like a working bakery with cookie sheets, mixing bowls, rolling pins and bags upon bags of flour and sugar. Target Brand Ambassadors wearing bakery hats and aprons greeted guests through a large serving window and distributed custom-made gingerbread cookies in branded packaging featuring a recipe and ingredient list on the back to drive store traffic.

To complement the cookies, a team of roaming Brand Ambassadors served hot chocolate from branded backpack canisters. A holiday ornament and button creation station was also available, as kids colored and decorated a special keepsake.

The most popular keepsakes, however, were the family photos taken inside two life-sized Target-branded snow globes. Crowds gathered to both wait in line and watch the merriment, as up to six adults or kids could enter each globe, throw snow and get their holiday picture taken, which was retrievable online.

Additional custom environmental pieces, such as gingerbread trees, marshmallow snowmen, window boxes full of lollipops, wrapped gift packages and tree lights abound were punctuated by a fireworks display to kick off the celebration.

The Results

Consumers were thrilled with the interactive installation and the free treats, compliments of Target. The environment received coverage on all local media networks as well. The three-day installation yielded the following results (1).

• 2,135 installation visitors

• 1,569 branded holiday photos taken

• 158 gallons of hot chocolate distributed

• 13,500 gingerbread cookies distributed

Excerpt of fan posts on Facebook:

“Thanks for the great memories! Looking forward to next year already.”

“Thanks for the cookies, Target!!”

“Bullseye will be there!!!! What more could you ask for?”

(1) Source: Agency research