In Japan, McDonald’s holds dominance for hamburgers. Burger King is still a little-known brand, with just 100 outlets vs. McDonald’s having about 3,000.

With this situation, we needed to establish a brand presence. We harnessed the opportunity of “Shibuya Halloween,” which has become a major movement, raising interest in our target of youth while enhancing engagement.

However, in 2018, some participants of Shibuya Halloween became riotous. This caused society, especially youth, to sense unprecedented levels of danger for this event.

We strategically took advantage of the youth culture of Shibuya Halloween to capture empathy.

Shrewdly using the heightened sense of danger and mood of self-restraint, we closed the Shibuya Center-gai restaurant in emergency right before Halloween…or so it seemed. After just one day, the restaurant made a resurrection as the “SHIBUYA GHOST STORE,” where customers could enjoy the truly authentic vibe of Halloween in a safe and secure environment, providing a Halloween that youth could empathize with.

As other companies were going through trial and error in addressing Halloween, we took the bold move of “closing the outlet” and then staging a resurrection as an about-face, rolling out a speedy, precise story that fully leveraged current events.

The target was youth who were distressed by the atrocity of the 2018 Shibuya Halloween.

We set the final form of our communication to be an embodiment of the ideal Shibuya Halloween that they seek, with the setting at Burger King Shibuya branch that is located at the forefront of the event. During that process, we focused on creating captivating, topical news so that information would ripple through mass and social media, designing a story from “store-closing” to “resurrection” that strategically reflected the heightened mood of self-restraint and sense of danger in society.

On October 21, Burger King Shibuya Center-gai branch abruptly closed “in emergency,” mysteriously expressing that it was “a countermeasure for Shibuya Halloween.”

Speculation about the sudden closing was rife on mass and social media, and on the following day (Oct. 22) in the middle of the commotion, the restaurant was resurrected in just one day as the “SHIBUYA GHOST STORE.”

With the outlet remodeled to look like an abandoned building and zombie workers wearing realistic makeup, we extravagantly rendered an authentic and special space. At the same time, we prevented crowding by limiting the menu, stopped sales of alcoholic beverages, and carefully positioned security guards to balance fun with reassurance for a Halloween that youth could empathize with.

During the dates, the restaurant bustled as a major spot for Shibuya Halloween. As a result, we captured attention and empathy and successfully enhanced engagement with many in our target, especially youth. In addition to greatly improving brand presence, the initiative also contributed significantly to sales, making us the overwhelming winner of Shibuya Halloween.

-Brand Mentions 17,140 Tweets *Processed data for October 21–31, 2019 from M Data Co., Ltd. “TOPIC FINDER”

-Social Media Impression 5.4+ Million Impressions *Estimated with average number of followers (319) per Japanese national Twitter account

-Trending Topic in Japan (LINE News/Twitter/Yahoo Real-Time search)

-Record of past media coverage 267

-Media Impressions 86.9 Million

-Media Exposure 1.8 Million Dollars

-Sales Result 131.6% Sales growth rate during October 20–December 31, 2019