Launched in late Spring, US gym chain Planet Fitness offered students free gym access to help boost their mental health in the third annual iteration of its’ High School Summer Pass’ program which provides teenagers with free access to the chain’s 2,400 gyms across the country all summer.
To promote the initiative, Planet Fitness tasked agency Barkley to create a campaign that teens wouldn’t skip over or scroll past, but rather one that they might actually binge
The resulting campaign was anchored by a 10 episode series titled ‘On This Repisode of High School Summer Pass’: an entire show promoting the brand’s free summer gym membership.
According to the agency, it was created primarily for teen-friendly platforms such as TikTok and Instagram Reels, the 10 comic video episodes (described as ‘Repisodes’) parody popular US teen shows such as ‘Ginny & Georgia’ and ‘Outer Banks’. But, rather than highlighting classic teenager storylines, each centres around life in the gym and the key benefits of the High School Summer Pass.
As well as the core social media ‘Repisodes’, Planet Fitness also released behind-the-scenes content, as well as an AR filter inspired by the tradition of high school yearbook superlatives. The filter assigns fun fitness-related superlatives to each individual teen’s selfie and then add it to a ‘High School Summer Pass Yearbook’.
The campaign was informed by a recently commissioned Planet Fitness study which found that 61% of US teens face mental health struggles and 93% appreciate how fitness can positively impact their lives. The research also established that 39% of teens felt regular exercise made them feel more energetic.
So High School Summer Pass’ aims to give teens a chance to prioritize not only their physical health but their mental and emotional health too.
The team at creative agency Barkley was led by Chief Creative Officer Katy Hornaday and included Vice Presidents Berk Wasserman and Andrew Diperi, Creative Directors Justin Smith, Eileen Hogan and Chris Larberg, Associate Creative Directors Sue Salvi and Ronald Nause, Art Director Lauren Meadows, Copywriters Mary Buzbee, Cameron Birdsall and Kimberly Chungong, Social Manager Brett Crawford, Chief Strategy Officer Chris Cardetti, Strategy Director Molly Smith, Strategists Maggie Brown and Lauren Dismond, Planning Director Katy Zimmerman, Planner Aaron Neal, Vice President Julie Barr, Brand Managers Haley Brantingham, Madie Waite and Emily Ditto, Producers Melany Esfeld, Charlie Stillman and Matthew Wilson, plus Director Of Production Laura Johnson.
Production was also run through a group at Cardboard Spaceship which included Director Brad Morris, Head Of Production Michael Sapienze, Executive Producer Matt Engelking, Line Producer Wojtek Stypko and Director Of Photography Chad Leathers.
Editorial was handled by Whitehouse Post (US) with Editor Paul Rummerfield, Head Of Production Melanie Klein and Producer Keren Plowden.
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Last year’s Planet Fitness ‘High School Summer Pass’ program motivated 3.5 million students to prioritize their physical and mental health by completing a combined total of 17 million workouts over a three-and-a-half-month period. And this 2023 campaign seeks to get even more teens to sign up.
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