THE BIG SLAB

Short List
TitleTHE BIG SLAB
BrandBALTER BREWING COMPANY
Product / ServiceBALTER BEER
CategoryG01. Local Brand
EntrantBALTER BREWING COMPANY Currumbin Waters, AUSTRALIA
Idea Creation DELOITTE DIGITAL Melbourne, AUSTRALIA
Production COLLECTIVE-DIGITAL Surfers Paradise, AUSTRALIA

Credits

Name Company Position
Adrian Mills Deloitte Digital Creative, Brand & Advertising Partner
Matt Lawson Deloitte Digital Chief Creative Officer & Partner
Charles Baylis Deloitte Digital Executive Creative Director
Rob Weir Deloitte Digital Head of Motion and Production
Stirling Howland Balter Brewing Company Brand Director & Co Founder
Lach Goldsworthy Balter Brewing Company Graphic Designer
Ben Trueman Balter Brewing Company Marketing Co-ordinator
Mike Calvino Collective Digital Director
Jamie Brooks Collective Digital Producer
Jamie Brooks Collective Digital Director Of Photography

Why is this work relevant for Brand Experience & Activation?

This is a great example of how we can reframe the brand experience if we look at things a different way. In this idea we didn't see the billboard as a space to place an advertisement on. We decided to make the media space intrinsic to the idea. And by doing that The Balter Big Slab did actually become a tourist experience. It even made the evening news! Hundreds of Aussies knowingly went to what was really just a billboard site with some fencing in front of it, to be part of the joke.

Background

Balter XPA is Australia’s favourite craft beer. But in an effort to go mainstream they needed to solve one problem: Not enough Australians knew that it even was a beer. XPA?

Describe the creative idea (20% of vote)

For this campaign, we had just enough money to buy one billboard. But funnily enough, when you look at that one billboard in the right way, it's exactly the same dimensions as a carton of Balter XPA beers.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

So, using our one single billboard, we made Balter XPA synonymous with being beer all across Queensland, with the introduction of the Balter Big Slab. A tongue-in-cheek ‘Big Thing’ tourist attraction where the joke was that it was clearly just a billboard, that just happened to be the shape of the slab. Yes, that sounds simple, but it really is a simple idea. The funny thing about it is that no-one had looked at a billboard and realised it's the same shape as a carton of beer.

Describe the execution (30% of vote)

Now, the truth about big Aussie tourist attractions is that they're a great place to get both funny selfies and over the top souvenirs. So we decided to encourage selfies and drive sales of merchandise (to give to charity). Then we PR'd it. Then we offered free "Mini Big Slabs" to the first 100 people who took a selfie. And the internet took it from there.

List the results (30% of vote)

We actually succeeded in turning this one, ugly, empty billboard into tourist attraction. Without transforming it at all. People actually visited it. And that made a lot of Aussies laugh. - Year on year sales up 92%. - Campaign reached 2.49 million people - Campaign investment only $45,000

Please tell us about the brand in relation to the locality or market where the product / service is distributed

Balter is a local Queensland Brewery based on the Gold Coast. Their number one beer is called XPA, but people really don't have a clue what XPA stands for. So we wanted to teach the locals that an XPA is actually a beer. The Big Slab billboard is just down the road from the brewery!