Menu
Outdoor & Events
 

The Gnome Protest

Issue 22 | March 2012

Agency

OgilvyAction Düsselfdorf

Creative Team

Executive Creative Director: Martin Seele; Art Director: Lee Manton; Copywriter: Mike Dawe, Nadja Franke

Production Team

Post Production: Congaz Audio Visual Company GmbH Düsseldorf; Audioproduction: Sprachlabor Audioproduktionen GmbH Düsseldorf; Photography: Robert Eikelpoth

Other Credits

Art Buying: Carol Redfield; Account Management: Werner Hesse-Quack, Cordula Mehler

Date

November 2011

Background

toom was one of the largest hardware stores in Germany, with one of the best garden planning services and a huge array of plants and flowers. The only problem was, no one really knew about this part of the store. The challenge was to create a campaign that got people talking about toom as well as driving them to visit the store specifically for its range of garden products.

Idea

Who would be most saddened by a neglected garden, allowed to become overgrown and filled with rubbish? The people who live there, the garden gnomes.

The creative idea was to get the gnomes of Düsseldorf out onto the streets in protest.

Gnomes were placed all around the city in both public places and in unexpected locations. From the number of them it was clear, the gnomes were up in arms.

They carried placards with messages like ‘Seeds Not Weeds!’ and ‘Just Say Mow’.

On the other side was copy with a call to action, directing the reader to help by clearing up their garden with a visit to toom.

One gnome tweeted about his day of action on Twitter and on the gmone’s Facebook page, prizes were offered to members of the piublic who uploaded pictures of the revolting gnomes.

Results

No results, as yet

Our Thoughts

It sometimes exasperates me that the most innovative creative ideas are often in communications to Gen Y. It is assumed that the over-50’s have fossilised in front of the TV with the newspaper open on their laps. So what I like about this is that it has been aimed at an older audience in the full expectation that they will tweet, email and post about the army of gnomes marching across the city.

The interesting thing about Word of Mouth Marketing is how spend (in the UK anyway) is reported to have increased 14.2% in the last three years while spend against traditional channels is, for the most part, down.

And that’s because if you can get people talking about you, then it’s not such a huge step for them to start buying from you. Even gnomes on strike, it seems, work.

Related Articles