014: Brands Leaning In on Year-End Activations

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TLDR:

1. Macy’s: Launches Game to Celebrate Cool Cats’ Parade Balloon

2. Balenciaga: Unveils Connected Merch for Balenciaga Music

3. Louis Vuitton: Introduces Exclusive VIA Tile Trunk Phygital 

4. ASOS: Launches First IRL Pop-Up Store & AR Catwalk Experience

5. e.l.f Cosmetics: Quickly Reaches 2M Visitors in Roblox Experience

6. Lacoste: Unveils Virtual Game Experience in The Sandbox

7. Coach: Partners with Zero10 to Offer Virtual Try-On in Five Stores

8. Oakley: Collaborates with Fortnite to Release IRL Glasses

9. Hot Topic: Adds Pudgy Penguins Merch in Select Stores

10. Shein: Offers Virtual Try-On for Care Bears Product

Around the Block…

• Macy’s: Launches Game to Celebrate Cool Cats’ Parade Balloon

  • The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade featured a Cool Cats balloon, the first-ever NFT-inspired balloon to be in the event

  • Cool Cats was selected to appear in a public vote held by Macy’s during the 2022 Thanksgiving Parade

  • To celebrate, Macy’s launched a digital parade game where game finishers were able to claim a digital trophy & a limited amount of IRL-connected figurines

  • Cool Cats also partnered with Macy’s to sell connected products online & in select stores, including a hoodie, plush, & figurine

  • Sources: Macy’s Discord / Cool Cats Discord

• Balenciaga: Unveils Connected Merch for Balenciaga Music

  • The luxury brand is expanding its music endeavors by offering NFC-embedded t-shirts & sweatshirts

  • The items are merch for London band, Archive, & cost $750-1250 each, available in select stores & online

  • Owners will be able to scan their item’s NFC chip to unlock an exclusive song by the band

  • Sources: Balenciaga

• Louis Vuitton: Introduces Exclusive VIA Tile Trunk Phygital

  • Continuing in the vein of exclusivity, LV unveiled a 200-item collection of branded trunks - available only to owners of their past collectible, the VIA Treasure Trunk

  • The Tile Trunk digital collectible costs €6,000 and will be redeemable for its physical twin starting February 2024

  • Sources: Louis Vuitton

• ASOS: Launches First IRL Pop-Up Store & AR Catwalk Experience

  • The digital retailer opened their first physical store, a pop-up in London, coinciding with Black Friday

  • Partnering with Snapchat, visitors were able to point their phone cameras at the front of the store to unlock an AR fashion show featuring avatars wearing ASOS products

  • Participants who snapshotted a specific avatar were able to pick up an in-store goodie bag

  • Sources: Fashion United / LinkedIn

• e.l.f Cosmetics: Quickly Reaches 2M Visitors in Roblox Experience

  • The ‘E.l.f UP’ experience launched in early November and has already seen strong performance in the lead-up to the holidays

  • The experience centers around the player building their own business - setting up a store, attracting customers, etc.

  • Players are rewarded by earning tickets that are redeemable for virtual items

  • Sources: Roblox / LinkedIn

• Lacoste: Unveils Virtual Game Experience in The Sandbox

  • Named ‘Lacoste World Tour,’ players can explore four worlds where they can complete missions & earn a reward at the end

  • Created in celebration of the company’s 90th anniversary

  • Sources: Lacoste / The Sandbox

• Coach: Partners with Zero10 to Offer Virtual Try-On in Five Stores

  • Visitors to select Boston, Atlanta, Toronto, & Austin locations will be able to try on handbags & sunglasses using Zero10’s AR mirrors through January 1st, 2024

  • This is Coach's second time working with Zero10. They originally partnered in Spring for their ‘In My Tabby’ activation

  • Sources: Retail Touchpoints

• Oakley: Collaborates with Fortnite to Release IRL Glasses

  • The brands’ partnership includes two physical glasses designs available through Oakley’s website starting November 29th

  • Sources: Oakley / HypeBeast

• Hot Topic: Adds Pudgy Penguins Merch in Select Stores

  • Hot Topic will be selling Pudgy’s ‘Clip-on plushie’ toys

  • The NFT brand is already available through Walmart & Amazon

  • Sources: Pudgy Penguins’ X

• Shein: Offers Virtual Try-On for Care Bears Product

  • The fashion retailer partnered with AR company, Geenee, allowing shoppers to try on select items through their website

  • The AR functionality can be opened through the item’s product page - asking users to grant access to their phone camera

  • Sources: Instagram

What is…?

• Eon: Tech company offering connected product services to brands, as used for the Balenciaga Music merch. IRL products are assigned a unique QR code, NFC chip, or RFID tag that creates a digital ID. The digital ID can link to information about the product, store production & ownership details, etc. Coach, Chloe, Target, and Victoria's Secret are among some of their brand partners (Eon).

• Beyond: Creative studio specializing in leveraging AR & 3D technologies for fashion & luxury brand activations. Brand partners include ASOS, Ralph Lauren, Louis Vuitton, Tiffany & Co. (Beyond).

• Supersocial: Metaverse company whose expertise is building Roblox experiences for brands. In addition to e.l.f Cosmetics, they’ve partnered with NARS, Warner Brothers, Crayola, Gucci, & Walmart (Supersocial).

Chain Reactions!

Year-End Crunch Time 🎁

We’ve made it to December, & a rush of projects just launched! Surprisingly, few seem directly focused on holiday content, whereas now’s as good of a time as any to drop.

Cool Cats’ balloon in the Macy’s Parade was a big moment for NFT culture to shine - & for many, probably a chance to look up & learn about the brand. They saw a nice uptick in Google searches according to trends data.

I’m excited by Balenciaga’s connected fashion products. Although we’ve seen NFC-dispursed music before through Puma & Roc Nation’s ‘Evolution of the Mixtape’ sneakers, I like the idea of NFC-enabled merch & it’s great to see another luxury fashion house leaning into the technology in creative ways.

Shout out to e.l.f and Supersocial for creating a successful Roblox experience. Although the content wasn’t holiday-related, great timing to get the brand top-of-mind to a large audience!

DISCLAIMER: This content does not contain investment, tax, legal, financial or other advice & is not intended to be used in this way. It includes the opinions of the author & is strictly for informational purposes. Please do your own research.