Soon, coming to a mall near you (if you live in Baltimore, Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, Philadelphia or San Francisco), a Sierra Mist Re-Gift Rap Battle. Essentially: A travelling mall show, rap battles. After that, it gets confusing. Hold on:
Cranberry Splash is a temporary, holiday spinoff from Sierra Mist, the also-ran in the lemon-lime soda battles from PepsiCo. To promote the drink, the company is putting on "Re-Gift Rap Battles" in malls across the country. Here's how it works: An audience member takes a re-wrapped ("re-gifted") gift from under the Sierra Mist tree and then raps about it "in a friendly way" (so says the PR) with another audience member.
The idea put to Creature, the Seattle-based ad agency that took on the assignment, was to create an engaging way for the brand's audience to interact with it. I'm not sure how re-gifting or rap battles came out of this, or what they have to do with Cran Splash's brand story. But if the idea is to get people to try the product (there are samples available at the battles) and possibly create an emotional connection while doing so, then Creature has succeeded.
For a product like Sierra Mist, it isn't enough in the post-advertising age to create a meaningful connection between audience and brand. For a one-time holiday spinoff, though, the campaign is basically bright colors and noise meant to get people to pay attention for a short period of time. I applaud Creature and PepsiCo for attempting to entertain and create a true experience here rather than taking the low road: TV, FSIs.
Enjoy the pics from the first battle:
