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.