Starbucks have woven themselves into people’s daily routine in a way that most brands would be envious of. So how do they introduce a new product, in a new format, available in an entirely new place?

Starbucks introduced their Chilled Classics in Summer 2017 as little cold bursts of coffee-fuelled goodness, available in chiller counters in all of your favourite supermarkets. So, instead of running an ATL campaign that might reduce footfall in their shops, we helped them get tactical in  this test site for experiential branding and product distribution.

COFFEE ON-THE-GO

We chose the usually run-down, always littered and depressingly astroturfed corner of Box Park by Shoreditch High Street overland station to inject a tiny respite of natural calm that imbued everything about the product’s chillaxed on-the-go vibe. A place where people could pause for a moment and enjoy the coffee that they love in a new, refreshing way. 

A PEACEFUL HAVEN
IN THE CITY

We knew we needed to make the Starbucks Chilled Classics garden so refreshing and unusual that people would pride themselves in being Instagrammed in it, so – for a week – we created a City peace haven. A place that people could hang out, enjoy the drink and, if so inclined, could look at our informative coffee-beds and learn a little more about the flavours that went into the drinks they were enjoying.

PUTTING CHILLED CLASSICS
ON THE MAP

This put Chilled Classics on the map, and let all of the heavy lifting be done through social. Of course it isn’t hard to get people in Shoreditch to Instagram* themselves, but maybe that was the idea in the first place. Giving people a beautiful place to stop for just enough time to take a photo is sometimes all you have to do to place your product visibly in the hands of the people that count.

*and Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter and Youtube.