How U-Studio, Oliver and Klondike got generation X to care again
Unilever’s U-Studio and Oliver Agency won at The Drum Awards for Social Media 2022 in the Most Effective Use of Group or Community category for its 'Bar-cade' campaign. Here, we find out how they re-engaged their gen X demographic.
Klondike's Bar-cade campaign won big at The Drum Social Media Awards / Credit: U-Studio / Klondike
We hear plenty about gen Z and millennials, but Gen X are still an essential demographic for a lot of brands. Not least frozen treat icons Klondike, whose core demographic is the 40-55-year-olds who haven’t been liking or subscribing much over recent years. With the help of Unilever’s Oliver-partnered in-house agency U-Studio, they brought the 80s back to gen X with a raft of activities surrounding the retro-themed ‘Klondike Bar-cade’.
The brief
The campaign targeted the hard-to-reach 40-55 demographic, despite the fact that that generation would be more familiar with TicTacs that TikToks.
To draw this reticent generation’s attention, the brand would deploy a series of gen X’s favorite arcade games, remixed with the brand’s best-loved products and newest innovations.
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The idea
Just as next-generation games consoles were being released, Klondike dropped Bar-cade. Alongside gamified social content, it gave away working Bar-cade consoles.
The campaign made use of new alongside existing social platforms, with Klondike becoming the first verified food brand on SpaceHey, a platform that recalls the nostalgic past of internet communication.
Among wide array of activations, the brand also set up the ‘What Would You Do’ hotline: a real number that gen Xers were able to call, and tell the brand what they’d do for a Klondike.
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The results
The real-world Bar-cade consoles proved so popular that some punters were caught on Twitter offering to trade their PlayStation 5s for them. Speaking of Twitter, the campaign won the brand a large fan base on the platform, which it was later able to transfer to Instagram with an additional ‘scavenger hunt’ activation. The latter itself generated over 15m impressions and a 5% follower increase on Instagram.
During October – in fact on the day of Meta’s famous 7-hour outage - #4aKlondike became the 20th most-tweeted hashtag on the planet.
This campaign was a winner at The Drum Awards for Social Media 2022. You can see all the winners here. The Drum Awards for Marketing are currently open for entry. Find out how you can enter now.