INSIGHT
The 3rd Grade is rough. For a lot of 8 year olds, it’s filled with a lot of firsts: first homework assignments, first organized sports, first chores, first cell phone. But it’s also the first time kids psychologically start to take notice of how they are perceived by their peers. Unfortunately, that means 8 years old is when a lot of kids also age-out of “pretend” play.
We embarked on a global research project to ask kids across the US, UK, Germany and China what was going on in their lives. And despite being from different ends of the earth, we saw a trend emerge that kids of this age were attracted to activities and play that offered them “more control”. Things like Minecraft and sandbox video games, DIY art and maker projects.
But it made sense. As boys of this age were experiencing a massive shift from childhood to adolescence, anything that could help put them back in control wasn’t just important… it was instinct.
STRATEGY
We wanted to reposition LEGO Creator as being the perfect building toy for these older boys. The Creator 3in1 franchise had always been popular for gift-givers as an easy value for money (you get three models in one box). We wanted to highlight how this wasn’t just a deal for the adult, but the opportunity for creative choice for the kids.
The tagline became our rallying cry: Your World, Your Rules. You’re the Creator. Compared to other LEGO franchises, we operated with an extremely tight budget so relied heavily on packaging and social content to share our message. Packaging was updated to highlight all three models inside. And we partnered with the ultimate makers — the LEGO designers themselves — to develop hands-on tutorials of the new sets as well as building tutorials for how to add on to the model with other loose bricks they had lying around.
2018 LEGO CREATOR 3in1
After gaining traction globally, the campaign strategy and repositioning was doubled down for the following year’s assortment. The messaging was aged up to keep older kids engaged, both in terms of model design and marketing materials.
yoUTuBE TUTORIALS
To keep kids inspired, we released over 16 building tutorials on YouTube under the hashtag #BuiltwithLEGOCreator (above). The videos gave add-on inspiration for nearly every model in the 2017 portfolio and were put together by the real LEGO designers themselves.
RESULTS
The new video content helped Creator become the most-viewed franchise on the LEGO Youtube channel. All with little to no paid media support. Year over year sales increased globally. But most importantly, we helped get a little of that building love back with a new swagger.
My role: lead global campaign strategy, lead qualitative research, developed connections plan and worked with product design team on the 2018 model portfolio.