Advertising is a service business, and, at Christmas time we like to thank the clients who so kindly pay us by giving them clever gifts to make them feel great about us, despite the constant travails of marketing in this era. Ultimately though, advertising is a narcissistic business, and at any opportunity we use innovation to demonstrate well beyond our buzzwords what we’re capable of in the, er, digital space. Hence, an idea where these worlds could meet: TBWA\Toy Lab. This Christmas we decided to make our clients happy, by making their kids happy, and allow their children to draw the toy of their dreams. We then used 3D printing technology, then created unique packages that were sent wrapped to our clients children to be put under the tree. Along the way we got to promote to other clients and our peers that we weren’t traditional thinkers with a joy-filled film.

For the kids, and let’s not forget how important they are to this idea, this was a great deal of fun and extremely gratifying. So often they are given what others have conceived and marketed, but to have that turned around so that they control the creation of the thing they play with, that is something special. For the clients, we had our most positive sentiment ever for a Christmas card. And for us, our video received over 10K views on YouTube, it landed our Head of Digital a speaker engagement at this year’s SXSW Interactive Festival, and mention on over 42 industry and tech sites in a very competitive time of year. Additionally, our McDonald’s France contacted our Paris office and is currently in production to bring this idea to market for customizing kids happy meal toys in France, something we certainly didn’t plan, nor see coming.