Results and Effectiveness

Although the tide soon demolished our sand bottles, the ripples they created live on. In a single week, they generated over 210,000 social network impressions for a total of ZERO media dollars invested. Digitally, 60,000 people were involved in the project. This unannounced act, and uniquely Coca-Cola brand experience, inspired positive chatter between teens across Hong Kong, and created no negative impact on our precious ecology.

Creative Execution

With youthful passion, we transformed a regular beach into 10,000 handmade Coke “sand bottles”, in just over an hour. And after creating 32 huge happy starbursts covering over 5,000 sq. metres of sand, the teens left the spot in silence. Dawn swimmers and pass-bys couldn’t believe the sight that met their eyes. Words soon spread, along with amateur photos. Causing a viral chain of questions: ‘Who made this? Why?’. Then we seeded short films online to give out some clues. These further exploded onto Facebook, Weibo, youtube, forums, e-magazines and personal blogs.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

This summer, Coca-Cola wanted to create some genuine, spontaneous happiness for teens on the beach. And we wanted to hijack this unusual and under-explored medium for our message. But how? We came up with a wild idea that cost nothing at all. On 27th August 2011, 200 teens received a secret mission: to invade one of Hong Kong’s favorite beach, Shek O in the dark.