Business - Applications

High-profile sports event branding specialists ICON delivered the iconic look and feel of London 2012, UEFA Euro 2012 and the FIFA World Cup 2010, turning spaces into world-class branded environments

This year saw them working on the Ryder Cup, which took place at Gleneagles from September 23rd to 28th.  The event saw success not only for the European Team, but also for all those involved behind the scenes in staging one of the world’s largest sporting events.

ICON played a major operational role delivering The Ryder Cup’s look programme which was such an important element of the event presentation. Set against the stunning Perthshire scenery, ICON was responsible for dressing all the tees, grandstands, camera towers and scoreboards in addition to some impressive signature pieces within the tented village, media compound and both opening and closing ceremonies.

Working with original designs developed by Ryder Cup Europe’s creative agency Total Design, ICON’s production facility supplied approaching 10,000 individual items, all of which had to be collated, delivered and installed by a crew of 42 men over a month-long build-up. The 18th Green Grandstand alone carried over 430 square metres of branding – enough to completely wrap five London buses! Added to that were the 21 other grandstands, 14 big screens, over 300 wayfinding signs, 400 crowd barrier jackets, two kilometres of fence dressing, 147 flagpoles and eight interactive pods with built-in RFID technology.

Wherever possible, elements were recycled from The 2010 Ryder Cup at Celtic Manor, where ICON delivered a similar programme, and re-branded to the event’s new livery. ICON also worked with Ryder Cup Europe over the preceding twelve months to develop the scope of works for the Look, Branding and Wayfinding at Gleneagles.

Commented David Gurney, ICON’s Head of Golf Operations: “The Ryder Cup is a huge challenge, from the initial production phase through to the on-site build. Given the sheer scale of the event we have to be very flexible and ready to adapt to new demands each day, and we fully appreciate the trust that Ryder Cup Europe place in us by awarding us this responsibility.”

Ryder Cup Operations Director Antonia Beggs stated: “ICON has been a trusted member of the operational team, not just for The Ryder Cup, but also for other major events on the European Tour at home and overseas for nearly forty years now. It is a tribute to their high standard of workmanship, reliability and flexibility that this relationship has lasted for so long and we continue to place our faith in them to deliver outstanding results for an event of the stature of The Ryder Cup.”

We all love big billboards.  Along with huge building wraps, they epitomise wide format printing more than any other application. Premium OOH (Out of Home) large format specialist blowUp Media has been doing some great installs of late and we're delighted they're keeping LFR in the loop.

The latest landmark installation for blowUP Media is a major new Giant Poster site at King’s Cross mainline terminus in London, with the new Renault Twingo as the site’s launch advertiser.

The 72 sqm King’s Cross site is directly in line with the immense footfall from the station terminus and, as it will reach 2.8 million people during campaign periods, is ideal for advertisers seeking to make their brand stand out to a large number of people in a short period of time.

As the only Giant Poster positioned directly opposite Kings Cross Rail and Underground stations and St Pancras Station, this site is perfectly positioned to target a retail, business and leisure audience active day and night.

King’s Cross attracts a young audience and is in close proximity to venues such as Central Saint Martins art school and alternative music venue Scala, as well as a number of popular bars and restaurants including the famous Big Chill House and Caravan restaurant.

As it also directly overlooks Euston Road the site is also visible to a large and slow moving audience of motorised travellers through London.

The Twingo campaign uses three blowUP sites in total, with further posters on 333 Old St, part of blowUP’s East London domination package, and at Manchester Piccadilly Tavern.

Giant Posters are an excellent medium for demonstrating the look of the car and its key qualities as a city car ideal for everyday use. At 138 sqm 333 Old St will reach 854,000 consumers while the 192 sqm Manchester Piccadilly Tavern will reach almost one million.

The media planning and buying agency for the campaign is MGOMD and the out of home specialist Talon.

blowUP media CEO Katrin Robertson says: “It’s great to be able to launch our fantastic new King’s Cross banner alongside the new Renault Twingo. The multiple banner campaign in London and Manchester shows once more the ability of Giant Posters to support launches in the automotive sector.”

Storage solutions are dull right? And school storage is often just as dull in miniature - typically the thinking is simply to shrink adult-sized office storage solutions, and to then paint them in primary colours.  Yet take a creative mind, add an Inca Onset S20 digital printer, and as the oft-repeated mantra in relation to UV-printing goes: "The only limitation is your imagination".

Finding innovative and space-saving ways to store equipment within the school environment can be a challenge; making the storage fun and safe at the same time requires a creative approach.  Brazilian POS design and production company Artwork Digital was given just that task by the Bau Econhecimento School. The school wanted low-cost, mobile storage boxes for books, films, costumes, puppets and props used in students’ ecology and environment lessons. Light and easy to move around, the boxes had to be safe to handle while being colourful and appealing to the students. With a consideration for the environment, they also had to be produced using 100% recycled and recyclable substrates.

Seven boxes were produced. Made from 16mm re-board, each box comprised two doors, two drawers, shelf and lid, mounted on casters. The individual box parts were digitally printed on Artwork Digital’s Inca Onset S20 flatbed printer using solvent free UV inks, before being cut and assembled.

Rômulo Guimarães from Artwork Digital says: “Although very technical, this project gave us the opportunity to be especially creative and to let our imaginations go back to our childhood for inspiration.”

The project also received an Inca IDEAs award in the Product Decoration & Unique Designs category. Judges commented: “Thinking inside and outside the box.” And “Great use of product decoration showing Inca isn’t just for cardboard and paper.”

www.artworkdigital.com.br

Premium large format out of home company blowUP media UK is this week launching its new M4 Outbound site which, at 490sqm, will be the largest and most impactful outdoor site along the M4 wealth corridor. The company has already signed up luxury watch brand Breitling as its launch advertiser.

The site will be the third largest in London and, because of its position extremely close to the road, will maximise the sheer size and scale it delivers for brands.  The location targets traffic heading out of central London towards Heathrow and the affluent counties in the West. It is estimated that 2.7 million vehicles will pass the new site each week, making it ideal for reaching high-income business and financial executives as well as upmarket travellers heading to Heathrow.  In addition it is surrounded by show-stopping motor dealerships such as Mercedes and Audi.

Katrin Robertson, CEO of blowUP media, comments: “This is a truly iconic site and a superb asset for the stream of major advertisers who use this site to reach these key audiences. The M4 Outbound will deliver greater standout, penetration and memorability for their brands and enable them to own the M4 for the period of their display.”

 

Hull-based plastics manufacturing specialist Ino-Plaz lit up the Almere Shopping Centre in The Netherlands.  The company was commissioned by architectural lighting specialist Kemps to get involved with an exciting and challenging lighting project for the shopping mall which is one of the largest in The Netherlands.

The brief was to produce 52 light swirls to be suspended from the ceiling on the side of the escalators and around the perimeter bulkhead.  Each individual light swirl was specified at 120mm deep and the project involved creating eleven individual swirl structure designs, ranging from two metres to seven metres in length.

Quality was paramount to Ino-Plaz as they needed to produce the lenses using a material that was reliable, resilient and long lasting. Taking into account the unique requirements for this highly specialised solution, Ino-Plaz recommended Paperlinx Altuglas 25mm Clear Acrylic as the best product for this particular application.  The Paperlinx range of Altuglas Acrylics features constant light transmission which means colours appear the same, irrespective of how thick the sheet is and whether they are illuminated or non-illuminated.

Each lighting swirl was hand sanded to a frosted finish on three sides then mitred where needed to join the multiple sections, creating the longer swirls. Operations Manager Tim Loft explained the rationale behind this approach: “If you shine bright light through a clear Acrylic it doesn’t break the surface; frosting it - which we did by hand - diffuses the light better.”

The lenses created by Ino-Plaz were then retro-fitted into the lighting units supplied by Kemps and installed on site to create a striking and visually impressive display across the mall’s two floors.

“We were delighted with the representation and superior illumination of the finished product,” said Tim. “We identified that the best product for this application was PaperlinX Altuglas which would meet the exact requirements of a very specific brief.  We needed a strong, durable material with excellent illumination properties and Paperlinx perfectly matched our requirements as it is also easy to thermoform and fabricate.”

The English Rugby Football Union, which is hosting next year’s Rugby World Cup, has booked two blowUP media digital large format screens in Cardiff and Birmingham, plus a blowUP Giant Poster site in Leeds to promote the opening of ticket sales to the third largest event in world sport.

The campaign will run on sites strategically selected close to key rugby grounds where World Cup games will take place.  The Super Motion digital screens in Cardiff and Birmingham will offer high quality full motion digital content to grab the rugby audience’s attention while the stunning 120 sqm Leeds City Square site directly opposite the train station is perfectly positioned to capture the vehicular and pedestrian rugby audience in Leeds.

With the home teams believed to have a good chance of reaching the final stages of the World Cup, which starts in September 2015, the campaign should stimulate interest among rugby fans in these key areas in an impactful and memorable way. blowUP media has a tradition of being used for major sporting events including the Olympics and the football World Cup, since Giant Posters offer the perfect platform for announcements and amplifying marketing messages.

Media agency Zenith, together with OOH specialist  Posterscope, has booked the campaign. Matt O’Hara, Account Planner at Zenith comments: “Banners provide the ideal medium for speaking to hard-to-reach audiences in Leeds, Birmingham and Cardiff, in a way that is both impactful and truly resonates.”

blowUP media CEO Katrin Robertson comments: “With the World Cup still a year away, the scale and impact provided by our sites is ideal for visually grabbing rugby fans and reminding them that they’d better book their tickets early before they sell out.”

[Image shows blowUP media digital large format screen in Cardiff]