Mobile carrier Three leveraged the FIFA World Cup with an in-store and digital ambush fronted by a squad of former England stars and centered on the signage rebranding of some of its flagship shops with three lion emojis.
The cuddly, animated social media style triple lion emblems, refrencing the England team’s ‘three lions’ nickname and badge, have replaced the brand’s familiar numerical logo in its Manchester (Arndale), London (Islington), Birmingham, Brighton and Portsmouth stores.
The ambush stunt was fronted by several former England players – including Teddy Sheringham, Tony Adams, Ray Parlour and John Barnes. – who appeared at the store opening.
beat the wall. take on the pros in store in the #ThreeWallBall challenge. win the ultimate football party with an England legend + Samsung stuff! pic.twitter.com/lG8XDWpy4J
— Three UK (@ThreeUK) June 13, 2018
While former United star Wes Brown appeared in the Manchester outlet,
Join us today at our @ThreeUK Manchester Arndale store to take on @WesBrown24 at the #ThreeWallBall Challenge! you could win the ultimate football party with your mates & @SamsungUK goodies pic.twitter.com/iONmyeV2YA
— Three UK (@ThreeUK) June 13, 2018
and David Seaman signed merchandising in-store at in the brand’s Birmingham store.
in our Birmingham store right now, signing merch @thedavidseaman head down there now & take part in our #ThreeWallBall challenge – you could win the ultimate football party with your mates and a legend + @SamsungUK stuff pic.twitter.com/gJZ6bWtWF5
— Three UK (@ThreeUK) June 14, 2018
Consumers, shoppers and football fans took selfies with the players and attempt a further strand of the ambush activity – the #ThreeWallBall Challenge.
This is a Samsung product incentivised competition, which runs from 12 June to 6 July, that encourages skilled fans to show how many times they can flick a ball against a wall: recording on their mobiles and sharing the footage on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram with the #ThreeWallBall hashtag.
The campaign, with the core idea delivered by W Communications, saw former soccer stars like Paul Merson give the challenge a go and share it on their own social platforms.
I’m at the @ThreeUK store in Portsmouth on the 15th June, attempting the #ThreeWallBall challenge, share your own attempt to win big with @ThreeUK Nominations @LinvoyPrimusPro, @HarveyBradderss (tell your dad)& @Sammerson1, #ad pic.twitter.com/9pYXCCIcJU
— Paul Merson (@PaulMerse) June 13, 2018
Kat Ward-Smith, director of brand and communications at Three, said: “We wanted to do something fun to show our support for the boys. We’re proud to bring together such well-known football stars this summer and the #ThreeWallBall challenge, will hopefully bring a smile to supporters’ faces across the country.”
Comment:
We’ve seen the seeds of this kind of shop logo signage rebranding before: for example 3 rival O2 did a similar thing (with the red rose) to activative its England Rugby sponsorship at the 2015 World Cup (see case study).
But this sneaky smart stunt ties the mobile brand to the England team and the World Cup without the need to shell out for official partnership rights.
Surely this is one of the more overtly blatant pieces of Russia 2018 challenger brand ambush marketing?
Mobile telco rivals O2 and FA/Wembley partner EE must be audibly sighing.
Links:
3
https://www.youtube.com/user/three
https://www.facebook.com/ThreeUK/
W Communications
