Six campaigns that shaped our agency: StrawberryFrog at 20

Over the years, we’ve developed our ‘cultural movement’ model, based on our unique skill-set, to drive a new, organic growth capability that scales from start-up to large enterprise. With the 20th anniversary of the agency fast approaching, we’ve been taking a look back at the key client relationships that have helped to shape our model and moved our own culture as a business on to the next level.

Smart Car

Back in 1999, Smart Car effectively became our launch client. Rather than a straightforward advertising campaign, we pitched a movement to reinvent the urban environment. The brand launch included events and advertising that turned this new B-Segment vehicle into a talking item around urban settings among the creative class. The launch brought StrawberryFrog a lot of attention on the global advertising scene. What’s more, we learned from this launch is that a brand with a cause is more powerful and more engaging than a brand with just a great TV commercial. Thus, our unique brand-fueled movement marketing approach was born.

Heineken

Heineken was really the client to put our StrawberryFrog agency on the global map. We competed against McCann and Wieden & Kennedy for the global account and won. We handled all global brand advertising across all territories (first time Heineken did one global campaign); the focus was on an idea to rally friends around Heineken under the motto "Meet You There". Before working with us, Heineken had done their advertising on a market-by-market basis.

With StrawberryFrog as their advertising agency at the helm in New York City, Heineken did their first ever global advertising campaign across all territories, including the United States, France, Singapore, the Caribbean and Brazil. We also devised and launched Heineken Champions League soccer platform and activation with the global cultural movement ‘Championism’ and ‘Welcome to Champions Planet’. We were also responsible for the global James Bond Heineken franchise work as well as the launch of Heineken's Beertender brand, and the global Heineken music program.

Jim Beam

The American Whiskey category is conservative and somewhat of an old boys’ club. When StrawberryFrog began working with Jim Beam, it was selling at substantially lower prices than Jack Daniels, and it needed a big idea as well as a shot of confidence. We developed a strategy to relaunch the 200-year-old brand in the USA under the banner Bold Choice to inspire a new generation of drinkers to try the brand. And then we took it to another level by taking a stand against the patriarchy and for equality with the motto Make History with the spokesperson Mila Kunis. The product moved off the shelves, prices were increased and HH penetration went through the roof especially among the new generation. That's how you make history and, for StrawberryFrog, the outcome was substantial growth in the US.

Pampers

P&G's biggest brand was being disrupted by competition and house brands. Their customers were being intercepted digitally at every turn. StrawberryFrog’s solution was a digital movement strategy that helped to reinvent the customer journey for Pampers across all digital and social platforms.

We redesigned the Pampers website from a bland information space to feel like a publication full of relevant content for new moms and dads. Our research showed that we had to capture new moms at conception. Then, we designed the Hello Baby Pregnancy Calendar App that went from 20,000 downloads a month to well over 100,000 and then we took it globally. We created tools that let moms easily schedule visits to the doctor, monitor sleep patterns, meet other new moms, and capture every smile. Not your ordinary diaper.

SunTrust

Every category has its unique challenges and opportunity. SunTrust is a unique purpose-based brand with an outstanding management team who think big.

Together with the team, we launched the onUp movement internally, and then externally at national cultural tent pole moments such as the Super Bowl, the finals of the Voice, and the 2018 Winter Olympics. Today onUp has 3.7 million participants at onUp.com. At the very start, we kicked off the onUpMovement at the Super Bowl and ignited a conversation about the greatest challenge facing Americans: financial insecurity. We helped people move from financial stress to confidence and as the movement grew, we shifted our focus from the stress to inspiring people with confidence.

Sabra Hummus

After growing businesses and brands across the US and across the world, StrawberryFrog had the opportunity to show what it had learned over all the years when it was approached by the founder of a new hummus brand called Sabra. This was a real story ‘David vs Goliath’ story, going up against some truly huge food companies.

When we started working with the leaders of Sabra, they were looking at a market dominated by Kraft Athenos and Nestle Tribe Hummus. Both had over 35% share of a growing foodie market targeting the 8% of Americans who are gourmands. StrawberryFrog had learned a thing or two about following the sheep so we said no, this was not our market. We went after the 92% who order Chinese every night or eat spray cheese. We wanted to inspire them to try a better-for-you, delicious food. And our solution? A movement called ‘the great food intervention’. We went across America - first with firemen - and then with the general population and inspired them to take up their arms in defense of good Sabra Hummus. Today Sabra is over 60% market share, Tribe has shrunk to under 10% and Kraft Athenos...well let's just say they are no longer for sale.

Veronica Horta is creative resource manager at StrawberryFrog