MADE OF JAPAN
ONITSUKA TIGER / STRAWBERRYFROG / INTEGRATED
Onitsuka Tiger is a Japanese athletics company founded in Kobe in 1949. It became known as ASICS in 1977. Decades later we were tasked o reintroduce the original heritage brand to a modern global streetware audience and, over the following years we fought for attention alongside wealthier and more-established players like Nike, Adi, Puma, etc.
What followed was a love affair with Japan and craftsmanship. I lead five years of global integrated campaigns built around a simple but ownable point of difference - where the Onitsuka Tiger comes from. We developed an approach that built each campaign around one authentic insight that came to life as a giant shoe. The shoe would feature as a physical installation, as well as form the core of the digital experience, the film content, retail systems and even product. It was continuously unique, innovative, honest and painstakingly crafted, and it successfully built the Onitsuka Tiger brand into an icon, sold a ton of shoes and won us loads of awards too.
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MADE OF JAPAN 1
Cannes Silver, Cyber
The FWA Site of the DayELECTRIC TIGERLAND
ADCN SILVER, Integrated
Featured in book 50 Shoes that Changed the World
Featured in book “How 30 Great Ads Were Made: From Idea to Campaign”
Featured in book Taken by Surprise: Cutting-Edge Collaborations Between Designers, Artists and Brands
One Show Nominated, Integrated Campaign
Meribel Ad Festival Crystal award, Integrated
Eurobest Shortlist: Integrated
Dutch Design Awards Winner: Brand and Strategy
Japan Magazine Fashion Association Special award for excellence in Magazine advertising
Cannes Finalist, Titanium
Clio Finalist, Print
Montreau Finalist
Promax/BDA State of Design show ShowcaseZODIAC RACE
Communicator Awards GOLD, Integrated Campaign
Communicator Awards SILVER, Animation in film
Communicator Awards SILVER, Marketing Effectiveness
ADCN SILVER, Integrated
One Show Finalist, Craft: Animation/Motion Graphics
Media & Marketing Awards Winner, international Integrated AwardTANSU
EuroBest GRAND PRIX, Design
Media & Marketing Awards Best Use of Content
Cannes Gold, Design
Cannes Shortlist, Best Low Budget Campaign
Cannes Shortlist, Best social media marketing
Cannes Shortlist, Design - Self Promotion
One Show Winner, Collateral Design
MADE OF JAPAN
Our first giant shoe was conceived to reflect how Japanese culture is encountered and portrayed outside of Japan. Constructed from Japanese ephemera and designed by Japan-inspired graphic artist, Gary Baseman. As well as the physical shoe acting as the icon at the heart of the campaign, an accompanying print and display component juxtaposed misconceptions about Japan with authentic hand-cut paper dioramas while an online experience scraped images tagged ‘Japan’ and layered them up to create an ever evolving digital version of our shoe, essentially a live representation of the world’s impression of Japan at any given moment.
ELECTRIC TIGERLAND
Taking cues from the impressions of a Japanese metropolis we used cutting-edge 3D printing to bring to life a huge city in a sneaker. Complete with myriad lights, ambient sounds and hidden details, the shoe formed the basis of a digital, print and retail campaign that included an electric light product film, shoe fly-through video, digital experience, special edition led magazine covers, and even a limited run of glow-in-the-dark sneakers.
ZODIAC RACE
To celebrate Onitsuka Tiger’s fiftieth anniversary, we created a sneaker sculpture that brought the legend of the Japanese zodiac to life. Telling the story of a race between the different animals of the zodiac, our giant sneaker was a diorama portraying different regions of japan, with mechanical tracks putting the race in motion. An animated film dramatized the race and its competitors and plays-out using a mix of 3D, 2D and film of the diorama itself. The shoe toured the world, together with zodiac-themed retail assets. A print campaign and collection book introduced zodiac-themed sneakers and apparel while, online, a 3D world, built in Unity, enabled visitors to go onto the shoe island and explore as you would with Google Maps.
This charming campaign was also an especially successful business case. In the UK alone, onitsukatiger.com saw a 436% increase in visitors and the length of time spent on site doubled. By integrating zodiac-themed product into the collection and giving consumers a way to find the pieces that matched their inner animal, sales also rose and footfall at stores rose considerably.
TANSU
Tansu was the fourth incarnation of the Made of Japan series for Onitsuka Tiger. We found and collaborated-with a team of 9th generation traditional Japanese cabinet (TANSU) makers to realize this vision. The craftsmanship and attention to detail, evident in the elaborate opening and locking mechanisms, hidden compartments and secret draws, made this piece truly unique and gave us a great story to tell.
The sneaker’s global tour was a resounding success. At stores and trade fairs, sneaker fans tried to unlock the secret compartments to claim the treasures within. Intrigued, people went on-line to discover more. Unique visits to onitsukatiger.com grew 125%, while total traffic saw a massive increase of 460%. Interest in the collection went up 20%, direct traffic (word of mouth) increased 40%, and referral traffic jumped 152%. The story of the shoe spread around the world, through blogs, tweets, magazines, showing that sometimes, to build something beautiful, even in a virtual world, you need the tools of a craftsman.
