Adventures of Orange.

Since Aperol’s conception in 1919, the drink has had a rich provenance steeped in elegantly crafted poster artwork by illustrators such as Lorenzo Mattotti. In keeping with tradition, we developed a new contemporary style and story for the brand that paid respects to the drink’s celebrated artistic history. Craft was paramount.

We created a series of short animated films purpose built for a unique media format – 360º digital screens that surround the major tennis courts. To stand out from the clutter, the animations were designed to react spontaneously to the space to surprise captivated stadium audiences. We achieved this by telling the story of an Aperol orange travelling through an Italian summer, interacting with on-screen summer elements and real-life obstacles, like commentary boxes, doorways, and camera operators.

Our execution was of an orange on a pinball-like journey through an Italian summer world to communicate Aperol’s brand identity. Careful consideration went into how the orange moved around the screens to best use the space and create intrigue – bouncing, sliding, and falling before being sliced into an Aperol Spritz.

The design language was based on geometric shapes with the use of large bold patterns that helped the piece to feel playful and contemporary. We played with scale, bringing the work closer to an art installation than a real environment. The colour palette exuded Mediterranean summer – warm oranges and yellows complemented by mediterranean blues and teals.

The animation of the orange infused energy and cheekiness with a bounciness to the movement and a touch of mischief to the orange’s behaviour. This was made evident by adding a graphic squash and stretch to the orange’s movement.

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Aperol’s brand character is incredibly social, smart casual, light-hearted, fresh, sunny, spontaneous, bright, happy, and most importantly, refreshing. The Australian Open, hosted in Melbourne during the hot summer month of January, embodies the same characteristics.

Beyond choosing the Australian Open Tennis sponsorship because of this brand fit, media around the event gave Aperol the ability to drive trial on the spot. Our meticulously crafted animations were placed around the event to drive spectators to Australian Open Club Aperol bars where Australians could experience Aperol’s distinctive orange bittersweet taste.

In addition, Aperol’s target audience were ‘metrotechs’ – mid 20’s-30’s trendsetters with a thirst for discovery. True gratification for these people comes from sharing newly found knowledge with friends. The strategy was to reach metrotechs at the Australian Open and get them to spread the word about Aperol being the perfect summer drink.

Aperol Spritz is an Italian bittersweet aperitif made by Campari. The drink has high awareness across Europe, but low awareness in Australia. We had to introduce Australians to Aperol Spritz using a sponsorship of a major sporting event, the Australian Open Tennis. The objective was to raise brand awareness, drive sales, and communicate the brand’s global message of ‘summer in a glass’.

Our task was to create animated artwork for 8ft tall 360º digital stadium signage on the major courts, digital outdoor screens around the event, digital display on the Australian Open website, sponsored social media ads on Twitter and Facebook, as well as Snapchat geofilters.