The Lounge predicts trends for 2011

The Lounge was trend forecasting in The Evening Standard this week, From 11 for 2K11: Trends to watch out for in 2011 (Mon 20/12/10) :

Anti-social networks

Forget having 1,576 Facebook friends. James Layfield, director of The Lounge marketing agency, predicts that 2011 will be the year we begin to personalise our online friendships. "We will choose to tighten our friendship circles, turning to the likes of Path, which allows a maximum of 50 contacts, and Diaspora, which sorts your connections into aspects so that any private information you post will only be shared with the people you really know," suggests Layfield.

Chromaroma - turning mundane journeys into a game

Chromaroma is a new immersive game that aims to make your real-life journeys around London more fun by using travel details logged by your Oyster card. It maps visualisations of your journeys around the city online in your account and encouraging competitive gameplay with others.

Brought to our attention by Lounge Trend Hunter Rachel, 23, the real fun lies in joining one of four online teams and accepting missions to earn points, such as visiting a new station. It's similar to becoming mayor of a venue on Foursquare, as when you check in a location enough times your team 'owns' it. Other teams can usurp your ownership by checking in more often.

Chromaroma feeds into the emerging digital trend of turning mundane aspects of daily life (in this case, the commute to work) into a game with digital platforms and 'real life' become increasingly blurred. Another example of this trend is the smart phone application Epic Win that turns your to-do list into a game - you reach new levels as you complete your real-life chores.

Timberland and the gift that keeps on giving

As Jack Frost was just about to start doing his rounds, The Lounge hit the streets to raise awareness of Timberland’s range of Earthkeepers footwear.

Our trusty Brand Ambassadors were deployed onto Oxford Street and Regent Street armed with Timberland jackets and shoes (which helped to avoid the bitter elements!) and were tasked to hand out Timberland's specially made ‘bags for life’. In line with the range of footwear, the bags were made from recycled products and were a gift from Timberland to the lucky Christmas shoppers.

After an amusing start to the day where the general public thought we were handing out free Timberland clothing whilst we were getting the staff their uniforms (“You can’t blame me for asking!” said one person), the bags literally flew out of our hands and by the end of Sunday we had made 64,000 people a little happier and a little greener.

- Anthony, Operations Manager

Nokia's ice touchscreen

Martin Homent, The Lounge Group's Creative Director comments:

Six years ago at a D&AD lecture, I was told that my entire world would fit in my pocket. My photos, videos, friends, diary, entertainment, music and games. And not just that. It would all be
on one device.

Six years on it seems to be something we take for granted. But at the time, this was the vision of Frank Nuovo, the Chief Designer at Nokia. He referred to it as the 'digital pocket'.

It's easy to forget just how pioneering Nokia are when the handheld market today is seemingly dominated by Apple and Blackberry. But it's this kind of thinking that has set Nokia apart from the competition and given them numerous 'firsts' in the world of technology. (I was lucky enough to see a museum full of them at their headquarters in Finland - a gadget geek's dream).

Can you handle 33 HOT girls?

Take a look at this fab Lynx Top Trumps game which launches on Facebook today.

The stunning Alex is but one of a selection of 33 hot Lynx Mynx’s who make up Lynx Top Trumps. Each girl is rated on a set of key pulling criteria – curves, kissability, brainpower, naughtiness, stamina and Lynx Factor.

The first 1,000 guys to prove they can handle a bevvy of Lynx Mynx's by ending up with all the cards in the palm of their hand, win a pack of Lynx Top Trumps so hurry up and play for your best chance to win!

Lynx Top Trumps enables guys to test the power of the new Lynx Eau De Toilette range, which gives a concentrated Lynx Effect, meaning guys might just get more girls than they can handle.

Visit the Lynx Facebook page . 'Happy Playing!'

Imagine... a boat like this as part of your campaign

This is fantastic - a 'capsized' yet fully functional half-boat, made to look like it's full-sized and sinking. Imaginative and playful, it certainly makes you look twice and could generate great publicity for a campaign.

Created by the French artist Julien Berthier.


Submitted by Lounge Trend Hunter Lily, 20, Venice.

Europe loves cycling, but what does this mean for brands?

Cycling may be particularly trendy at the moment but it's more than just a fashion. It's an integral part of many people's lives - an alternative to the gym or the train; a 'green' statement and a hobby. There are opportunities for brands to build loyalty by becoming the facilitator or innovator of this lifestyle passion.

Naturally Barclays cycle hire scheme is one obvious - and high budget - example. It demonstrates the bank's generosity and adds value to the activity itself: it frees cyclists from the worry of theft or the hassle of where to leave their bike.

Another concern for cyclists is arriving at work sweaty and bedraggled. Brands could encourage consumer love by taking inspiration from the Adidas Runbase in Tokyo. The 'Runbase' is a concept store where runners can shower for free, rent lockers and borrow Adidas running gear.

It's not difficult to imagine a branded 'Cycle base' in Britain. Not all offices have showers so this could be a generous way of a brand enabling more people to cycle to work.

BE A LEGEND ON CAMPUS WITH RED BULL

Do you go to every social event or do you make an appearance? Are you kitted out in style or do you set the trend? Are you always up for a good night out or do you make the party?

Have you got what it takes to be a part of the Red Bull Student Team?

We hope so because we have heard on the grapevine that our good friends at Red Bull are looking for the nation’s finest students to represent them and we reckon you might be able to help.

You’ll be the envy of all your mates and a legend on campus as you represent Red Bull at uni and become an integral part of their student activites.

The Lounge Group is recruiting 12 determined young live wires to work for Red Bull and represent them on campus as well as being part of the bigger picture, so if this sounds like you drop us an email at chooseme@theloungegroup.com to apply.

Be quick though as this as the deadline for applications is this Monday morning (29.11.10) at 9am.

This post is not related to the previous post 'We're recruiting'!

We're recruiting!

The Lounge are looking for people between the ages of 18-35 to be part of a European community for a famous global brand.


Do you have a passionate interest/or work in any of the following areas; music, photography, action sports and urban art?


We are looking to recruit fluent English speakers living in/originally from Spain, France, Italy, Hungary, Austria, Denmark, Norway and Sweden to be part of this project.

Brylcreem Boy Kevin Pietersen in blindfold cricket

A video of our favourite Brylcreem boy, Kevin Pietersen, went viral today. Basically it shows him batting blindfolded and he's still awesome!

At the end Kevin bats Brylcreem Paste. Easy to confuse the two though without being blindfolded - it comes in cricket ball-shaped packaging.

It was covered by The Metro too (23rd Nov 2010), Kevin Pietersen plays blindfold cricket in YouTube clip - and still hits sixes

We're currently working on the launch campaign of the new Brylcreem product, partnering with Bench stores. At participating Bench stores you receive a scratch card with purchase which gives you the chance to win one of the brand new Brylcreem Paste balls (as did Liam from One Direction last week!) or a money off voucher.

Squishies and Silly Bandz: tween playground crazes

Tweens from our Network have been telling us about Silly Bandz, a massive craze doing the rounds at schools. Apparently though, the next big thing in the UK is set to be Squishies.

First with Silly Bandz. They are brightly-coloured elastic bands that come in loads of different shapes, from hearts to dollar signs. You wear them around your wrist where they look like wiggly bands.

Popular product purchasing: Tokyo's ranKing ranQueen

The Lounge have recently been out and about trend spotting in Japan and couldn’t help but let everyone back home know about ranKing ranQueen, a Japanese gift store with a difference.

The concept is unique. Each of the 8 small stores stock and rank the top 3, 5 or 10 most popular products of the moment for easy comparison. They do this through a combination of assessing sales data from department stores and conducting their own independent research with consumers on Tokyo’s busy streets. This data is then used to assign a ranking to everything across a range of categories from the latest confectionary, beauty products and mobile phones to the more weird and wonderful sections that include items such as eggplant toothpaste, jelly toothpicks and wax masks.

Liam from One Direction wins a Brylcreem Paste

Nice to see that our promotions have the X Factor as the Lounge delivers Brylcreem directly into the hands of celebrities!

The guys from One Direction were visiting the Covent Garden Bench store, and whilst there, they look part in our Brylcreem Paste scratch card promotion. Lucky Liam came away smiling, as he won a full sized Paste product.

Look how pleased he is!

The power of brand immersion - drinking Spritz in Italy

Our Italian Lounge Trend Hunter, Lily (aged 20, Venice) has been telling us about spritz...


Spritz is a typical and widespread drinking tradition in Northern Italy. It is a wine-based cocktail commonly served as an aperitif in northern Italy, especially the Veneto region and surrounding areas. However, as of late, the custom is picking up momentum and spreading across Italy and Germany. The drink is prepared with Prosecco, a dash of a liqueur such as Aperol and topped off with sparkling mineral water. It’s served over ice in a lowball glass, garnished with a slice of orange and an olive and a bowl of crisps on the side. Aperol - produced by Campari - has become the most popular type of spritz and in essence is the identity behind this lifestyle.

Lynx All Nighter

Just over 2 weeks ago (doesn't time fly?!) we hosted a VIP experience for some lucky Lynx consumers at the Lynx Musicstar All Nighter event. The line up included Professor Green, Miss Dynamite, Roll Deep and Audio Bullys and was held at Alexandra Palace on halloween night.

For a true Musicstar experience, we made the VIP area into a music stars penthouse, complete with bedroom and bathroom themed areas a full DJ line up and live feed from the main room. One lucky winner also had their own area with personalised drinks service from our gorgeous Lynx Minxs, a chauffeur driven limo to and from the event and an overnight stay in a luxury penthouse apartment for her and 7 of her friends!

In addition, the VVIP area was 'green room' themed, guests were personally escorted from the private entrance by our lovely Lynx Minxs and spent the night in style.

Our prize winners and guests all seemed to have a cracking time and managed to, erm, keep it up all night!

Stella Artois launch new product in classic style

Just came across this pretty slick launch for the new Stella Artois Black for InBev (through Mother & Punchdrunk).
Awesome theatrical take on an on-trade promotion transporting consumers (literally!) into the era which is the essence of the brand. Storylines and setting are intended to evoke the nostalgia of classic French cinema, with four different narratives on offer. The idea is that 'passengers' then trade experiences back in the bar after their journey. Nice!

It is kicking off on the 14th Nov in Village East and running for 2 weeks.

Link: Stella Artois Black Presents The Night Chaffeur

Cheers!
Tina

Film's a driving force - 3D projection mapping for the Toyota Auris Hybrid

The Lounge's creative director, Martin Homent appeared in The Metro this week (Tues 9th Nov) in the D&AD article 'Film's a driving force'.

Martin comments on 'Get your energy back', 3D projection mapping by Glue Isobar for the Toyota Auris Hybrid.

Check out The Lounge's slideshare

...because it's full of insightful presentation slides into the world of under 35s.

If you want to find out more about students, tweens and how your brand can engage them more effectively, visit www.slideshare.net/loungegroup

wanted : Social media manager

The Lounge Group is hiring.
Our clients are running some great campaigns and looking to launch a few over the next few weeks. So that's where you come in. We're looking for someone with ideas, solutions and how to put it all together. You get to join a very cool team bursting with great ideas and a history of highly successful campaigns.

Once you've put all the parts together, got the sign offs, we want you to roll it out. Get it out there to the hungry web. Promote it, spread the word, encourage the activations, interact with the followers, influencers, even the dodgy ones.
Then, once your amazing campaign is live we need you to monitor, measure, optimise. Making sure our clients are blown away by this amazing industry we call Social Media. Show them what these amazing tools do for their brand.
This is the process that you will be a part of, from the ideas through to the live activity.

We are looking for someone that is passionate about everything web, especially SM sphere. Are you a cool geek? Show us your blog or blogs, what's your twitter account address? Do you have some great case studies from previous campaigns? Plugged in Last.fm to foursquare api's to recommend great pubs based on music choice? --- don't worry, neither have we, just an example!

Looking for people with around 2 years experience in Social Media.

Send your CV to hello@theloungegroup.com and tell me why you are keen to get on board this funky little ship we like to call The Lounge Group.

Speak soon!

Can brands still make the cut for students?

Marketing Week's article on 28th October features The Lounge's director, Sara Gil, talking about how brands need to take the time to understand students if they want to build brand loyalty with them.

The article discusses our recent "Freshers Safari" to the University of Surrey, where we observed freshers and older students in their natural environment to gain insight into their worlds and to learn how brands can connect with them better.

(The article says we're a research agency but we're actually a BTL marketing agency, working from research and insight through to activation.)

Excerpt from the article:

'The Lounge director Sara Gil says marketers should take time to understand today’s students to avoid adopting a “back in my uni days…” approach to this market.

What are teens putting on their bedroom walls?

The Lounge has been speaking to The Evening Standard about how teenagers are decorating their rooms.

Posters from Smash Hits magazine no longer seem to cut it as many teens are getting serious about interior decoration, even buying original artwork to pimp their bedrooms and turn them into stylish hideaways.

We questioned members of our Network of 10,000 under 35 year olds about this to find out what teenagers are really getting up to in their rooms decor-wise.

Our 'Digital Social Life of Tweens' event

Yesterday we held an insight event showcasing our recent research study into 'The Digital Social Life of Tweens'.

Experiential vending machines are sharing the love for free

Several FMCG brands are using the medium of The Vending Machine to engage consumers in a new way.

Rather than simply taking the dough and giving up the goodies (or not, as the case may be given the frequent unreliability of the things) these vending machines are providing imaginative and interactive experiences which reward the consumer with a free product.

Tweens event tomorrow!

We've all been getting VERY excited at Lounge HQ as it's 'The Digital Social Life of Tweens' event tomorrow morning.



The event is at Adam Street private members' club, The Strand, London at 9am.

Some of the slides from the presentation plus a video of the event will be available online post-event.

Can't wait for tomorrow!!!

'The Digital Social Life of Tweens' - event this Wednesday

This Wednesday we are holding a breakfast event showcasing our recent research into 'The Digital Social Life of Tweens'. It's all about young teenagers and their relationship with brands and social media.

Another win! Silver for Brand Experience Amplification/Integration

We've just won a Brand Experience award - silver for our Lynx Fever campaign in the Amplification/Integration category at the FMBE awards!

Here are Sara and James (The Lounge's directors) and Emma (Head of Client Services) looking very happy indeed...

The Lounge wins Agency of the Year

We are delighted to announce that The Lounge Group won Agency of the Year in the Brand Experience category of the Gramia Awards last night.

The Agency Awards are a celebration of an agency's work over a number of campaigns and we were judged to have displayed consistently high quality in the execution of our work and followed our Gramia for Lynx for Brazilian Hot Mud Wrestling. We are chuffed to have been recognised for the Agency's successes in areas such as client management and people development as well as the creative output and the results of the campaign.

The ceremony was held in the Savoy hotel's newly refurbished ballroom, which was a suitably grand setting and winning the award was a great end to a really lovely evening.

Have a look at how good our shiny our new awards look on our trophy shelf!

Upcoming young British comedians

Immensely shareable, funny and original, there are numerous young comedians in the UK gaining exposure and popularity on YouTube. Many of their sketches are quintessentially British.

If you are familiar with the term ‘rah’ (if you aren’t, check out the definition of 'rah' in the Urban Dictionary) then you will probably appreciate Gap Yah. With a massive 2m views, it’s a take on the irritating tendency of some privileged students to reference their gap year. It begins with our Rah telling his friend Tarquin that he can’t go shopping on the King’s Road that day as he’s LITERALLY in Burma.

Play with your food - Veggie Bots

Veggie Bots are “a set of kitchen tools that transform boring vegetables into building blocks for toys" according to its inventor, Lee Bayless. Children put the blocks together and make creations out of their greens.

Hello from the Operations Team

Hello all! It is time for us in the operations team to post our first Lounge blog, how very exciting! We take care of all the logistical elements of all the campaigns that take place at The Lounge, whether it be hiring the staff, the venue or the equipment etc. So it’s only fitting that we choose some kind of experiential activity that has really caught our eye.

As a follower of The Lounge you’ll know that we like to do things slightly differently. We don’t tend to do things by halves. To successfully engage with the under 35s our campaigns need to be edgy, quirky and unusual. The leafleting campaign below certainly ticks all those boxes.

Innocent's '5 for 5' pop-up cafe

The Sunday before last I took a trip to Innocent's '5 for 5' pop-up cafe in East London for lunch, tempted by the idea of getting 5 of my '5 a day' for only £5 (having spent a couple of weeks skiving off eating enough fruit and veg!)

The cafe was only open for a week, from the 1st of October, with a menu by celebrity chef Gizzi Erskine. The setup looked great and was held in a big warehouse-like space. It had been made to feel like a country fête with bunting and pots of herbs dotted around, with everyone sat down communally on wagamama-style wooden benches.

Superswarmldn - the UK's first 250 check in on foursquare

Niel Armstrong - the moon, Edmond Hillary - Everest, Amelia Earhart - The Atlantic, Vincent Haywood and 249 others - UK's first SuperSwarm Badge on Foursquare.

Maybe not up there with those names, yet at 19:03 October 7th, the UK foursquare community unlocked the UK's first Super Swarm Badge and damn we were proud.

The Lounge

We were featured in Campaign last week about our partnership with Pernod Ricard's Havana Club. Having carried out an in-depth consumer insight project for the brand, we're now working with them to develop and deliver their positioning and the creative platform for 2011 and beyond.

The Lounge's Freshers Safari was a great success!

On Friday we held a trend safari to the University of Surrey to see 'Freshers in their natural habitat' in order to learn more about this demographic, the lifestyle of new students and their relationships with brands.

Today we're off on safari...a Freshers Safari!

Today we're off on a Freshers Safari at the University of Surrey with nine marketing, brand and insight managers.

We will be tweeting live from the event all day. Follow us on Twitter @LoungeGroup and get in on the conversation (#trendsafari).

We will be meeting with Freshers in their natural habitat - the Freshers fair - to see how students are responding to brands down there, as well as visiting a student house, chatting to university societies, panel discussions with students, meeting key student influencers and going on a student night out. Snake bite at the ready...

The weather may not quite rival the African plain but it's going to be a fun and insightful day!Disclaimer: There will be no actual zebras. Apologies

Our campaign for Lynx Fever wins an Event Award!

We are the proud winners of an Event Award - Best Brand Experience at a Festival for our Lynx Fever brazilian hot mud wrestling campaign.

Twitter attack summary - what happened

Yesterday morning Security experts Sophos put out a message saying that twitter was being exploited by users that had figured out how to use a flaw to allow messages to pop-up and other sites to open in your browser window. In some cases users were redirected to a hardcore porn site in Japan.

Justin Bieber follows me - Celebs get on board Twitchange for Haiti

Okay he doesn't, but for $510 he will for 90 days. Or if I pay $2,325 : Justin Bieber will follow you on Twitter for a minimum of 90 days, will retweet one of your tweets and will send out a tweet including your @twitterhandle

That's nice. However if you aren't some easily-mind-controlled-bad-music-choosing-ten-year-old, you can choose to pay a multitude of celebrities for the same package here

Google to enter online music service

News has leaked that Google are to enter the online music service in its global battle with Apple. But question at The Lounge is...why now??

The digital music store and social networking apps sound like a cross between iTunes and Spotify, charging users $25 a year to store music on a cloud service or purchase an album for $7.

East London... cool?

If you live in or have even set foot in Shoreditch, Hoxton or Dalston in East London then you will be familiar with this 'sort' (referred to in the song as 'd*ckhead' but whom we will more diplomatically name 'The East London hipster').

1.5 million hits+ and growing, 'we're having new age fun, with a vintage feel!'

Spot-on send-up.

Got on the train from Cambridgeshire
Moved down to an East London flat
Got a moustache and a low cut vest
Some purple leggings
and a sailor tat
Just one gear on my fixie bike
got a plus one here for my gig tonight
I play synth... we all play synth...

This bit is classic:

Basically I'm a part time blogger and I design my own jewellery line... it's like a mix of religious iconography kind of with a Saved By The Bell vibe?

Student Freshers Safari

We are holding a student ‘Freshers’ Safari’ at the University of Surrey in Guildford on Friday 1st October.

We will be meeting in central London at 1pm with transport provided to the University of Surrey. We will arrive back in central London at around 11pm.

The Freshers' Safari itself will begin in Guildford at 2pm and finish between 8.30 – 10pm (depending on whether you want to accompany us to a student night out!)

The Safari is free as an introduction to The Lounge Group's Insight Safaris.

IKEA lets 100 cats loose in-store for new ad

Ikea's new TV ad starts tomorrow (Sat 11th Sep) with the tag-line 'Happy Inside'. Created by Mother London, it's part of a push to promote the 2011 catalogue.

The rationale is... cats live their lives in pursuit of comfort so are best-placed to judge what makes a home comfortable!

Behind-the-scene video:



It's a quirky idea but one that works as the theme of comfort is so relevant to the home.

Let's hope no Ikea shoppers are allergic to cats!

The xx Scoop Mercury Prize

Just look at the joy on their faces! You can tell that winning the most prestigious award in British music meant everything to fun bags, The xx, last night.

The London three-piece, triumphed after album 'xx' saw off heavyweights, Paul Weller, Biffy Clyro and Dizzee Rascal to win the award and £20,000 prize, voted for by leading industry figures.

Is breathing the new eating?

The Lounge’s favourite gourmet architects Bompas and Parr are at it again. For their next event they are recreating Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom as a Taste 'o' Rama that will allow spectators to enjoy key moments of the movie with their mouths. We’ve been lucky enough to get tickets so we’ll be keeping you posted. In the meantime we couldn’t help but talk about their recent Ziggurat of Flavour – our kind of healthy eating!

To promote the Fairtrade Foundation’s latest campaign ‘Power Up Your Fruit Bowl’ at The Big Chill festival the eccentric duo created a novel way to get your five-a-day.

Wiff Waff: ping pong partying

We've recently been enthusing about the merits of Rebel Bingo... now for ping pong parties! It's a logical combination (we'd also like to try Lawn Mower Surfing and Sexy Chess Parties if someone would please invent these).

Lego Architecture

I remember when I was 7, my brother and I had a huge canvas bag with a draw string that when tied, looked like Santa's sack. In the sack were hundred of bricks of Lego which we would spend hours creating, admittedly rubbish, houses and towns. Now Lego have me wanting to revisit these halcyon days with Lego Architecture.

Arcade Fire and Google Chrome - impressive viral marketing

Arcade Fire have just upped the bar for music videos and online band promotion with a new viral experience, partnering with Google Chrome.

The Wilderness Down Town is an interactive video accompaniment to Arcade Fire's single 'We Used to Wait', directed by Chris Milk.

Facebook places – where are we now ?

Unless you live on another planet you should know that Facebook places is out . There have been many reviews and thoughts as to what the service can do and how its the Foursquare or Gowalla killer.

So where are we, no pun intended, how has the reaction been and what's next?

At this point in the UK doesn't have access, but it is interesting to see the thoughts and opinions floating around from the loyalist Foursquarers to the facebook supporters.

Have you got what it takes to be a Lounge Trendhunter?

We’re looking for cutting-edge individuals around the world aged 11 - 35 to be our ‘Trend Hunters’. These are in-the-know people who keep us up-to-date with the latest things people are doing, excited by and talking about. We want to know about all the newest stuff – what’s creating a buzz amongst you and your friends.

Man Tweeted to round the world trip

Rather than letting his friends know what he's having for his tea, a British man has used Twitter to travel around the world.

Newly-wed journalist Paul Smith got back from his honeymoon and decided that he wanted to get more holiday time, with the aim of getting to Campbell Island, 200 miles off New Zealand, within 30 days. When his appeal was retweeted by Stephen Fry the campaign took off.

He managed to blag:
- Ferry ticket from Newcastle to Amsterdam (tweeter called Leanne)
- Train to Paris (two French tweeters)
- Free bed at a hostel
- Train to Saarbrucken
- Lift in car to Frankfurt (German tweeter Andrea Juchem)
- One-way flight from Frankfurt to New York (tweeter called Owen, using Air Miles)
- Spare bed in hotel room (tweeter from Yorkshire called Mark)
- Then travel to and stays in Washington DC, Chicago and San Francisco by plane, train and car (US tweeters)

- Flight to San Francisco (Zurich-based tweeter)
- Car to Los Angeles
- Free flight from LA to Auckland (Air New Zealand)
- Ferry to South Island
- Lift to tip of South Island (tweeter called Smiley)
- Boat to Stewart Island.

When Paul got to Stewart Island he hoped to get a lift on a boat to Campbell, but was unsuccessful. He said: "my main aim was to get as far around the world as I could in 30 days. When I gazed across the sea towards Campbell Island I didn’t feel like a beaten man. "

Air New Zealand offered him a free flight home where he set about writing up his experience in new book, 'Twitchhiker.'

Near Virtual London

Near Global allows you to virtually walk the streets of London's West End, shop, get information and even watch films and concerts in real-time. Global allows real companies to take online shopping a stage further, offering a hybrid shopping experience somewhere between real-life shopping and normal online. You can go up to shop windows and click on them to browse and buy.

Super Cute Kawaii! Harajuku girls come to London

The 6%DokiDoki World Tour: Harajuku Kawaii Experience comes to London's Japanese Art Festival this weekend (21/22 Aug).

Self Proclaimed 'Social Media Experts' - damaging

I mentioned the Influence Project a while back on my personal blog, plus if I recall I think I tweeted my link three times. Just to see how I did. Then a lot of articles came out against the whole thing. At first I thought it to be the usual bunch of people shooting down a good idea but looking a bit closer it all started making sense.

Our campaign for Lynx Fever is in Marketing Magazine!

Our campaign for Lynx Fever shower gel was featured in Marketing Magazine's experiential leagues 2010 article today!

The experiential campaign at T4 on the Beach and Boardmasters festivals last year has also just won the Gramia 2010 award for Best Brand Experience.

BRING BACK FITFINDER: Student Social Netflirting isn't dead yet

Ask most students and they’ll admit to having a library crush. Because the university library is not solely a place of serious study, but a sexually-charged hub of students subtly checking each other out over the screens of their laptops. From this mix of hormones, procrastination and high-pressure academia the FitFinder emerged.

Creation of UCL Computer Science undergrad Rich Martell, FitFinder has been described as cross between Twitter and a students’ lonely hearts column. However, students weren’t advertising themselves for love so much as sharing a bit of banter. Each uni had a ‘fit feed’ where students posted location-specific descriptions of hotties spotted around campus, e.g.:

“Pembroke Library: Female, Blonde, 1^st year classicist, can’t keep my eyes off you, PLEASE let me see your coliseum.”

Launched in April, the site received over 5m hits and covered 52 unis. It was forced to close after only one month due to mounting pressure from universities and Martell was fined by UCL for “bringing the college into disrepute”.

Despite some unis claimed that FitFinder was too distracting, they have been tolerant of Facebook which had very similar origins. Its prototype, ‘Facemash’, was created by Mark Zuckerberg as a Harvard version of HotOrNot.com. The real objection to FitFinder wasn’t procrastination. It was that students weren’t only documenting the ‘buff tings’ around campus but also the physical failings of their aesthetically-challenged peers (one post at UCL read,“body of an angel… face of a smashed crab”).

The FitFinder homepage has nearly 10,000 signatures petitioning its return and Martell has stated he plans to bring the site back. He’s already been approached by entrepreneurs looking to expand FitFinder to festivals and to create a mobile app. Brands could play upon the mating game facilitating boy- meets-girl in specific locations. Despite having come under fire for its ‘MunterHunter’ alter ego, FitFinder was always intended as banter between friends. The Fit Finding phenomenon isn’t over yet.

This blog also appears on Brand Republic's blog, The Wall

London's a real dream for teens: Lounge MD James Layfield talks to the Evening Standard about teens and brands

Our MD James Layfield appears in today's Evening Standard, interviewed for 'London's a real dream for teens' by Jasmine Gardner.

In the article about the Underage Festival, James tells The Evening Standard:

“Teens are in a position of power, because they have grown up with social media and computers,” says James Layfield, head of The Lounge, a London youth marketing agency that has conducted extensive research into the social lives of teenagers. “They can get more out of life because they are more aware of everything that is happening. They can be at one event in Covent Garden while receiving pictures uploaded by a friend somewhere else. It's a life of 'augmented reality' with an additional level to it.”

What Layfield and The Lounge discovered — and what no parent will be surprised to read — is that teenagers conduct their social lives primarily and wholeheartedly through Facebook.

It's where they develop and alter their identities, join groups that interest them and stay in touch with their favourite bands, brands and products. As a result, every brand out there is vying for their attention, seeing, as Layfield puts it, “the long-term value of young consumers. Brands really do want to get under the skin of these teens, because if they do, then they can make a lot of money”.

This is the reason we now have brands such as O2 and Orange doubling up as entertainment companies, sponsoring music arenas and half-price cinema tickets. And why Red Bull, one of the teens' most popular fan pages, pulls stunts such as Formula 1 pit-stops in Parliament Square.

But it's not an easy job. “In London teenagers are overwhelmed with opportunities,” says Layfield. “There is something happening every minute of every day that they could go to, often for free, but the hardest part is to get them out of their bedrooms in the first place. Because of the internet, a lot of them are a lot less imaginative than they might once have been. Teens want to be more entertained and that entertainment is much easier to come by now. So it's about creating something so engaging and exciting that they get interested.”