'Give the GIF of the Unexpected' - John Lewis Competition Brief
The brief was to create a campaign that would place John Lewis as the leaders of 'thoughtful gifting', specifically targeting a millennial audience. I decided to focus on the experiences that John Lewis offer as gifts, as these less- tangible gifts are growing in popularity, and are good gifts, in creating memories for the gift-receiver. I decided to focus on how these kind of gifts are a good surprise to give. Not only is the gift itself unexpected to receive, but can open up unexpected experiences. Therefore, I created a campaign focused around giving the 'GIF' of the unexpected, highlighting the power of a good old surprise, encouraging gift-hunters to buy an experience gift from John Lewis.
I maintained John Lewis's existing identity, in terms of using their typeface and paired-back layouts, but introduced a more playful, tongue-in-cheek tone of voice to appeal to this 'urbanite' audience. I felt in order for John Lewis to appeal to a younger generation, it needed to be less corporate in its approach.
'GIFS of the unexpected' to promote the gift experiences in a shareable way, that would appeal to the millennial
target audience.
The campaign would also be applied to the bottom of John Lewis receipts to make customers consider how they could improve their own gifting style.
Gifters can send their loved ones a GIF of the gift experience that they have got them, via a personalised email. Not only is this more convenient for the millennial audience, it also helps to reduce the waste of selling physical gift boxes. It seemed appropriate for a cat to be promoting sending GIFs on the internet.
Similarly, the identity could also be applied to packaging for experiences. At present, John Lewis do not market their in-store experiences as gift opportunities, which I think offers a huge opportunity to encourage more people to give experiences
as gifts.
When considering how to translate the 'unexpected' part of the original GIFs into printed leaflets, I decided to use a three-fold system so that the second part of the scene is unveiled. This means that the message at the end then has an impact, especially as each experience can be tailored to a different kind of individual.
In-store posters that apply the content from the GIFs and leaflets to make the campaign feel consistent both online and offline.
