Situation: Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream selected SZPR to concept and execute its “Own the City” campaign in San Diego and Orange County. The goal of the campaign was to introduce Dreyer’s array of exciting new flavors and products to working professionals and families while abiding by the mantra “Small Budget – Big Impact.” With limited funds, the team had to utilize unused and unusual resources to create a win-win solution for the Dreyer’s brand suite and their customers.
Dreyer’s wanted to re-energize brand loyalty locally among a new cross-section of potential customers. SZPR chose to create a campaign that could be replicated and exported to other major markets. To this end, SZPR came up with a four-prong approach to align the brand with the community, give customers a tangible experience with the brand, reach customers at every target demographic and create a big buzz. SZPR came up with four components targeting various facets of community involvement including the arts, sports, professional associations, and charity for children.
1. Rocky Road Lunch Break Challenge: a fun-filled scavenger hunt on the streets of downtown San Diego with teams of businesses competing to win a Dreyer’s Ice Cream freezer for their offices to garner both media and grassroots attention through word-of-mouth marketing and buzz.
It was important for the event to be staged in visible location with extensive foot traffic in order to interact with San Diego businesses and downtown pedestrians. SZPR used various tactics including developing extensive lists of local business associations to identify contact information for all members in San Diego and selected San Diego Downtown Partnership as the most viable marketing avenue.
SZPR distributed 500+ invitations to potential participating companies, surpassing its goal of signing up a minimum of 20 teams, including leaders such as San Diego Medical Services, Puma, San Diego Theatres, and the office of Assemblyperson Lori Saldana. The firm coordinated scavenger hunt logistics and reached out to local newspapers, radio stations, TV stations, online publications and magazines and canvassed downtown with posters and in-person visits.
On the day of the Rocky Road Lunch Break challenge, teams of 125 employees from local businesses competed for the chance to win a fully-stocked ice cream freezer for the rest of the year and other tasty prizes. To pre-promote the event, a partnership was established with KIFM 98.1 for on-air promotions and giveaways, as well as a station appearance and numerous mentions at the event. An anchor personality from NBC 7/39, Alicia Barnes, was brought in to emcee the challenge.
Results: The event resulted in a huge amount of buzz as company employees geared up to beat rival companies in the challenge in the name of Dreyer’s Ice Cream. The Dreyer’s brand name was plastered throughout the downtown business district and teams were plastered in Dreyer’s paraphernalia as they raced through the city determined to have their chance at unlimited ice cream. The “Dreyer’s Rocky Road Lunch Break Challenge” landed coverage from major local media outlets including, a morning segment on NBC 7/39 that featured a Dreyer’s spokesperson and one of the participating teams, San Diego Union-Tribune, SignonSanDiego.com, San Diego Reader, 944 Magazine, Hillquest.com, San Diego California Online, San Diego Daily Transcript, NBCSanDiego.com and San Diego Metropolitan Magazine. Dreyer’s has called SZPR’s execution “Flawless” and has since commissioned SZPR to run similar events in Orange County and New York.
2. The Dreyer’s Ice Cream Mural Contest: In an effort to reach out to college kids and the art community, SZPR and Dreyer’s approached a key customer, Hawaiian Saved Ice with a very visible building in need of revitalization that was in close proximity to the boardwalk and beach in San Diego. The owner agreed to partner with NESTLE® to create a mural to help liven up the storefront. SZPR collaborated with Platt (Media Arts) College, San Diego to distribute flyers and promote a contest for art students to design and paint an ice cream mural. The prize for the winning design was a $1,000 scholarship.
Five finalists had the chance to present their concepts visually to the Dreyer’s team and building owner. The winning mural design was selected for its bright, vivid colors which incorporated the playfulness of summer fun on the beach, a rollercoaster because of its proximity to local landmark Belmont Park and, of course, NESTLE ice cream treats to encourage consumption of this favorite summer snack. To celebrate the mural unveiling, NESTLE hosted an ice cream party for the students and observers. In less than two hours, 2,000 samples were handed out to beachgoers and people stopping by to check out the mural.
Results: The results of the campaign impacted the bottom line for the NESTLE customer as well as an attention-getting new media vehicle. According to the owner of Hawaiian Shaved Ice, sales of NESTLE ice cream products have doubled since last year. The San Diego Union-Tribune profiled the students and the vivid mural they created in a feature story. Allan Boyle from NESTLE heard about the project and added his compliments. “As the SBU communications guy, with a deep interest in P2P, I am always delighted to see initiatives like the San Diego mural. It is always difficult - however well we execute it - to get conventional POP material to stand out from the visual noise around it. To create the contest was a great idea, as not only is the location high traffic, but unexpected media, like the mural, always gets attention. The story with the local art school helps create excellent PR and an emotional connection between the brand and customers.
3. Little Heroes San Diego Padres Campaign: SZPR partnered with the San Diego Padres this summer to promote NESTLÉ® DRUMSTICK® Ice Cream Cone and reward local students for outstanding contributions to schools and local community. The NESTLE Little Heroes program leverages Dreyer’s Padres sponsorship and rewards 20 children throughout the summer who win four tickets to a Padres game, a chance to attend batting practice before the game, a hat and t-shirt, and best of all; they will be the "Playball Kid" of the game and have the opportunity to kick off the game by calling out "Let’s Playball!"
SZPR leveraged the relationship with the Padres to promote contest entries on the scoreboard during games at San Diego’s PETCO Park. In addition to sending out a press release soliciting contest entries, SZPR identified a diverse group of nonprofit organizations, schools and community groups and requested they submit their most worthy child for the contest. After being notified by SZPR that children were contest winners, parents cried and children could barely contain their excitement as they practiced over and over the words “Let’s Play Ball” that would start the baseball game. Wearing Nestle Drumstick hats and t-shirts, each of the 20 children were shown on the scoreboard and announced as “Nestle Drumstick Little Heroes.”
Results: Media coverage of our “Little Heroes” has included Today’s Local News, North County Times, Carmel Valley News, La Prensa, NBC, and more. Over the course of the summer baseball games, the Nestle Drumstick brand was exposed to nearly one million total attendees at San Diego’s PETCO Park.
4. Tonsillectomy Kit Children’s Hospital Campaign: SZPR created a Tonsillectomy Kit Campaign targeting Children’s Hospitals and families whose children had just had tonsillectomies to strengthen the Dreyer’s relationship with key customers for Dreyer’s (and East Coast counterpart Edy’s) Fruit Bars. SZPR's strategy was to incorporate all major brand positioning goals. It included a cause marketing component, aligned the Dreyer’s/Edy’s brand as healthy and fresh, simultaneously targeted individual and institutional consumers and was newsworthy. SZPR organized the campaign through children’s hospitals and distributed free tonsillectomy kits to recovering patients.
SZPR researched all the hospitals in the area and created a list of administrators to contact. SZPR enlisted children’s hospitals to contact their patients who had just had these procedures. Administrators where then given “tonsillectomy request forms” to hand to children who were eligible.
Results: The campaign distributed over 500 free tonsillectomy kits to recovering patients across San Diego and engaged over 1200 different people in the process. The campaign successfully met Dreyer’s objectives of raising community awareness and a hands-on targeted impact. Following the success of the San Diego launch, the program will be featured at hospitals in Atlanta, Denver, Indianapolis, Las Vegas, Mission Viejo, and Orange County. The book is currently being translated into Spanish as requested by Children’s Hospital San Diego to reach an even wider audience.
Overall Results: Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream was thrilled with the bottom-line results of the campaign which achieved over 90 Million media impressions. According to Diane McIntyre, Public Relations Manager, "SZPR has been a true partner to Dreyer’s Grand Ice Cream, integrating a hugely successful media plan that increased brand sales results. Their execution was flawless and produced results more than three times our initial goal."
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