By Odette Freedman, Account Director
With commuters rubbing their eyes in disbelief and wondering whether they had been transported into Narnia rather than Waterloo Station, we launched our Grosvenor Casinos ‘Call of the Wild’ Christmas campaign. The pop-up stunt was a life-size installation that took inspiration from the iconic painting ‘Dogs at Cards’ to reveal our wildest Christmas campaign yet.
It was an early start for the Grosvenor team who kicked-off the day with a ‘full house’ of animals as they met a deer, polar bear, husky, wolf and arctic fox at Waterloo station to play a game of cards and liven up the daily commute.
An early photo-call and picture desk sell-in captured the wild animals in all their glory (wearing masks made from the same people that make costumes for The Hobbit). Profiled influencers from far and wide were invited to meet our animals and kick-start the #callofthewild campaign… and all before we’d had our morning caffeine fix!
From 7am – 11pm, the public were invited to indulge their curiosity and join the animals for a hand of poker (as you do), not only to reveal their own animal instincts at a hand, but to be in with a chance of winning a Grosvenor Casino’s Christmas experience package.
The constant crowd had passers-by taking snapshots of the unusual poker game, grabbing selfies with their favourite animals and chatting to their friends on what they thought was going on and who was behind it. The Publicasity team were on -hand to reveal all, raise awareness of the casinos, Grosvenor sport and the Christmas campaign and drive hype throughout the day.
The activation caused buzz and social media conversation, driving over three million in reach and over 400 mentions across social channels. Standout coverage was secured on The Evening Standard online as one of their ‘pictures of the day’, on topical U.S. website Salon as well as multiple casino and gaming outlets.
With passing commuters commenting on social: ‘Awesome PR stunt at Waterloo Station. Wonder which amazing events company produced this?’ and ‘one of the best stunts I’ve seen’, the team collapsed into their beds at midnight reflecting that it had been a pretty special day in the life of PR!