FRYING PAN RELAY

TitleFRYING PAN RELAY
BrandTV SHOPPING LABORATORY CO.
Product / ServiceFRYING PAN
CategoryB01. Use of Digital in a Promotional Campaign
EntrantDENTSU Tokyo, JAPAN
Entrant Company DENTSU Tokyo, JAPAN
Advertising Agency DENTSU Tokyo, JAPAN
Production Company TAIYO KIKAKU Tokyo, JAPAN

Credits

Name Company Position
Yukio Sato DENTSU INC. Creative Director
Naoya Kudo DENTSU INC. Copywriter, Planner
Tatsuhito Kobayashi DENTSU INC. Marketing Planner
Yohei Takahashi DENTSU INC. Marketing Planner
Aki Daisho DENTSU INC. Creative Producer
Eiichi Shiraishi DENTSU INC. Account Executive
Keisuke Tsukada DENTSU INC. Account Executive
Saori Tani DENTSU INC. Account Executive
Ryota Izumiya TAIYO KIKAKU co.,ltd. Producer
Kazushige Fujie TAIYO KIKAKU co.,ltd. Producer
Shuhei Yamabe TAIYO KIKAKU co.,ltd. Director
Ryusuke Yoshida TAIYO KIKAKU co.,ltd. Production Manager
Shota Kusayanagi TAIYO KIKAKU co.,ltd. Production Manager
Yusuke Suga Freelance Cameraman
Kazunari Watanabe Freelance Lighting
Etsuko Akiba Freelance Art
Kuniko Tanaka TAIYO KIKAKU co.,ltd. Cooking
Katsuya Yamada Freelance Music
Makoto Watanabe Freelance Casting

Brief Explanation

FlavorStone is popular as a non-stick frying pan. In order to draw attention to it from Japanese market, this campaign chose Japanese Otaku people, those who are always in the hub of hot topics, as its communication target. In order to draw their interest's, we made use of their beloved maid girls and carried out a 'frying pan relay race' for proving FlavorStone's non-stickness. As a result, the campaign video went viral spreading from Otakus and caught national and global media attention. Otakus' passion did not stop but began to purchase FlavorStone for themselves, in order to feel the maid girls more closely.

The Brief

FlavorStone is popular all over the world. At the same time, however, to get additional recognition has been a difficult task. For market expansion, it was necessary to reconsider the former communication targeted at housewives and to invent a new approach to grabbing attention to FlavorStone. Thus, we started a campaign having Otakus as its communication target because they would love to spend their money on their favorites and to lead topics on the web. To draw their interests, we made use of their beloved maid girls and carried out a 'frying pan relay' for proving FlavorStone's non-stickness.

Describe the success of the promotion with both client and consumer including some quantifiable results

The campaign stimulated Otaku's maid-love spirit and went viral both in domestic and foreign countries. (ZERO PAID MEDIA overseas) The exposure reached more than 150 times in Japanese media and more than 30 times in foreign media, including the ones that do not usually cover topics for cookware. PR effects equal to almost 48 million yen. The campaign video was viewed almost 100 times the usual infomercial. In addition, FlavorStones began to be dealt not just by mail order but also in stores, with the effect of word-of-mouth. FlavorStone has now become a frying pan loved not just by Otakus but everyone. Furthermore, all the maid cafes, at which the maids in the video work, have purchased FlavorStones as official cookware after the campaign. A Japanese maid's live performance using a FlavorStone was born, leading the pan to be purchased not as cookware but as one of the 'fan goods' of Japanese maid girls.

Explain why the method of promotion was most relevant to the product or service

Our team went to a Japanese maid cafe and negotiated for the performance in autumn, 2014. Then we gathered 100 maids from all over the country and carried out an experiment in the end of the year for demonstrating FlavorStone's non-stickness. This demonstration movie went on air on TV and the web from January 2015. Its promotion site was launched at the same time. Just within one week, the campaign video went viral with more than one million views, starting from Otakus. Moreover, the video became a hot topic overseas after the launch in Japan, which brought another wave of popularity in our country. This was exactly according to our original marketing plan.