Actors address an unwitting coffee customer.
For Nestlé's Coffee-Mate Natural Bliss all-digital campaign that
launches today, the brand's marketers wanted to do something with a
little shock value. So they took over an Irving Farm Coffee Roasters
store in New York on April 24 with baristas wearing essentially nothing
but body paint.
"It was a one-day pop-up, and it was totally new for us," said Codie
Richards, shopper marketing manager at Nestlé. "We know that consumers
want something natural in their creamer. So what better way to talk
about it and make some noise?"
The basement of the coffee shop was the production unit's mission control, as the Nestlé brand and its agency, 360i,
huddled and watched the reactions of dozens of unwitting customers.
They'd walk in only to realize that the handful of workers—models and
actors putting on a performance, to be clear—behind the counter were not
wearing clothes. Patrons were also surprised to find that coffee was
free for the whole day.
Additionally, other performers sat "nude" (body paint as clothing remains a legal gray area,
including in New York) among the customers in the café-style shop. From
several hours of footage, Nestlé and 360i created a one-minute,
33-second video and a 30-second clip to be pushed on Facebook, YouTube
and other digital channels, with paid ads starting in the next few weeks
and running through September.
Using the hashtag #NaturalBlissCafé, the team hopes to turn heads on
social media with an au naturel strategy that's slightly skewed toward
millennial consumers.
"Nobody really sits around and thinks about coffee creamer," said
Michael Nuzzo, group creative director at 360i. "But when they do, they
kind of go, 'Hmmm.' It was fantastic how gung ho the [store] customers
were about the product."
Pierre Lipton, chief creative officer at 360i, humorously observed that
it was easy to distinguish the locals from the tourists coming into the
java hangout, which is located in Manhattan's trendy Lower East Side
neighborhood.
"The New Yorkers were more shocked that the coffee was free than by the
naked people making it," he said. "They casually took in that the
people were naked and then found out their drink was complimentary, and
they were like, 'Really?'"
Meanwhile, it's not the first time body-painted individuals have been
employed to promote a business. For instance, a restaurant in Lewisville, Texas, made waves in 2013 with the tactic.
Lastly, Nestlé began teasing the ad last night on YouTube. Check it out:
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