Our brief was to drive anticipation and buzz for IKEA’s hotly-anticipated arrival to London’s premier shopping district, Oxford Street.

We took the brand’s most recognisable and most sold product - the FRAKTA bag - and turned it into a huge billboard covering the new store, quite literally flying it like a flag over Oxford Street. This ‘poster’ is an exact replica of the legendary IKEA bag, but only bigger, bluer and baggier, echoing the pride IKEA have for this iconic store launch.

For both Londoners and visitors to the city, Oxford Street’s experience is famously stressful. It’s busy, noisy and full of people heads down in the shops, or commute to work. We wanted an approach to the hoardings that would not only encourage passersby to look up, but also bring them a moment of joy.

Our strategy was simple: “Remix an iconic London location with something iconically - and joyfully - IKEA.”

This was a beautifully simple idea that was tricky to execute over a four-month period.

The permissions obtained to place such a huge piece of OOH, where OOH has never been allowed before, had to be approved by both Westminster Council and The Crown Estate (literally the King). The bag was made to the exact scaled-up version of the original and created on a reflective material so it would reflect the time of day and weather conditions. If it was sunny it would have bright highlights, if it was an overcast day it would be flat or after dark it would be influenced by the street lights. It measures a huge 38m x 19m - making it unmissable.

The Big Blue Bag reveal catapulted IKEA into the limelight by harnessing a brand asset that is as iconic as the Oxford Street location.

In the first 100 days the Big Blue Bag was seen approximately 7,200,000 times. And it is still up, welcoming shoppers six months later - with around 2.5 million people taking the Big Blue Bag in every month - all for zero media investment.

This was just the tip of the iceberg with press coverage in national news media from The Independent to The Standard and The Mirror. More importantly it increased IKEA Word of Mouth by 10% in London vs the rest of the country (YouGov). Hardly surprising when it exploded across social media - from TikTok, to X, and even sparking inspiration on LinkedIn.

Google search interest in the IKEA Oxford Street store rocketed, up 284% vs the previous period (Google Trends).