To break through to our internet-savvy young audience in an authentic way we needed to be true to internet culture. We delved into the nuances of the online destinations that our audience regularly visited and the devices they preferred, *cough* mobile – duh.

We looked into how the internet responds and interacts with its community – it’s hilarious, it can be cruel, it has a dry sense of humor and WILL judge you. We would have to grow a thick skin and be willing to give the internet a reason to talk about us, to share us, and to have an opinion. 

Our creative partner created a new character, “The Mouth”, who acted as the master of ceremonies for our Mad Intense world. The purple mouthed character acted as a gateway into the surreal world of Stride which brought to life our new flavor combinations in bizarre ways.

We partnered with Snapchat’s king – DJ Khaled, a well-known celebrity and rapper. We invited Stride’s new computer generated character, “The Mouth”, to spend the day hanging out with Khaled at his studio.

Following this overnight fame, we launched into the wild and warped world of Stride and partnered with Snapchat to create a custom filter. It transformed users faces into a giant tongue as part of the Stride ‘Mouth.’

Our mobile-first approach delivered a rich media experience, transporting audiences through the various, weird worlds and flavors of Stride Gum on scaled platforms. We delivered bespoke integrations that generated conversation and connection to our audience. From TV bumpers on the cult cartoon station Adult Swim, customized mobile gaming units on Aki targeting users during mundane moments, reach, and relevancy on Facebook with animated GIFs, to a branded content show on Twitch, a live streaming video platform, called “Mad Intense Saturdays.”

Since launch, sales of Stride gum were the highest the brand had seen since 2013.

Our custom executions outperformed benchmarks, with partners referencing this campaign as best-in-class.

Our DJ Khaled partnership on Snapchat garnered 7.6MM views in a day, with our bespoke “The Mouth” filter generating 39.4MM views, in a single day. That’s more than the Oscars in 2016!

Our YouTube masthead across devices generated astronomical results with Google noting it was one of their most successful takeovers ever, generating 288MM impressions and 42MM unique reach. YouTube showed a best-in-class increase of 12.3% in overall brand awareness and a best-in-class 19.3% lift in purchase intent. Additionally, Facebook ad recall for Stride increased +7pts, with favorability up +4pts.

We received an outstanding reception on Twitch, generating 33k chat interactions, 2.8MM views of over 3.4MM mins of branded content, reaching 2.1MM uniques and over 280k uses of our custom emojis.