💥 I set myself a challenge: to create a product from A to Z
... a side project that I'm going to tell you about step by step, and in which we're going to give ourselves total creative freedom to have fun with communication and partnerships!
Good morning!
They always say that a good start to the new year requires new projects. Well, you're in for a treat: I'm taking on the challenge of launching a *real* physical product from A to Z, as a side project to this newsletter. It's an entrepreneurial project in which I want to give myself total creative freedom to have fun with the publicity and the partnerships, and to turn it into a laboratory for experimenting with lots of things.
And do you know what? I'm going to take you through it step by step, from finding suppliers to designing the branding, including the marketing and all the things I inevitably didn't plan. I won't reveal the product in question just yet, but I'll give you a few hints and let you guess in the comments (and of course follow me on Instagram to follow this project).
In the meantime, enjoy reading this issue, where you'll find an interview with the man who devised Paris 2024's social networking strategy, including all the creative constraints imposed by the Olympic Committee... and how he got round them!
🫡 Kéliane — keliane@komando.studio
Scarves on statues to change paternity leave in the UK
In short — Activists from the Dad Shift movement have caused a stir by attaching baby slings with fake babies to bronze statues of famous men in central London. The aim? To draw attention to the fact that the UK currently has the shortest paternity leave in Europe, and to argue for it to be improved.
Why it matters — The movement has taken up an idea actually initiated by Pregnant Then Screwed, a charity campaigning for the rights of working parents, which went to tie up scarves and dolls during Iron Man last year. In both cases, it's a good example of a low-budget but high-impact operation, going into busy public spaces with a simple set-up: dark bronze statues and flashy baby slings that get noticed straight away.
A pop-up restaurant where you have a 1 in 3 chance of getting the wrong order
In short — Have you heard of the Restaurant of Mistaken Orders? It's an ephemeral restaurant concept born in 2017 in Tokyo to lift the taboo on mental illness. The principle? The restaurant only employs people with dementia... hence the fact that the dish you order may not be the one that arrives at your table. And yet 99% of the customers come away delighted!
Why it matters — Because there are currently 35 million people in the world with mental disabilities (and the figure is expected to rise to 115 million by 2050): a problem that is likely to particularly affect Japan, where more than a quarter of the population is over 65. Hence the idea that the country should be at the forefront of learning how to include this population in its society. How can it do this? By putting customers in a position where they can not only accept an order error... but even enjoy it. A lesson in open-mindedness and inclusion.
What does the future hold for food in France?
In short — Food journalist (and author of the Pomelo newsletter) Ezechiel Zérah has come up with 10 ideas.
Why it matters — There are a few that particularly spoke to me:
Spin-offs for restaurants, as already exist for TV series. The idea? Take one product and build on it.
Cabinets of curiosities: the journalist imagines a space in the main restaurant of great chefs where they can tell their story and their world with objects that are important to them.
A shop... for sauces, both hot and cold (dressings, juices...), because they spice up any dish and it would make all the difference if you could take them home.
A loyalty scheme for independent restaurants, like Blackbird in the US
More and more luxury brand restaurants and goodies (what would an LVMH restaurant look like, for example?)
A week's room service in a restaurant or café for secondary school students, to introduce them to the world of service.
The fake internal email leak
In short — The LEON fast food chain has sent an email to its entire contact base with the subject line ‘[INTERNAL] Proposal to return Lucky Katsu’ with the preview text ‘The sender tried to call this message back on Monday 9 September 2024 at 08:14:12’. An error? No, a deliberate campaign in which the inside of the email simulates an exchange between the restaurant team and the CEO about whether or not to put one of its most popular dishes, Lucky Katsu, back on the menu. In short, you have the impression of being behind the scenes of an email exchange that you shouldn't have received.
Why it matters — Because there's fierce competition in your saturated inbox to get you to open an email. So, inevitably, these kinds of tricks pique your curiosity and are likely to make you click. At the risk of being a killjoy, I'm still cautious about the medium-term benefits, when the web user realises that it was a marketing ploy cooked up out of thin air, in terms of a relationship of trust with the brand...
To go further — The same mechanism was used in June by cosmetics brand Charlotte Tilbury, which ‘accidentally’ disclosed the before-and-after results of one of its products to subscribers to its newsletter, in the form of an email between the founder herself and the brand's scientific development director.
Reductions for waste
In short — In the UK, for World Cleanup Day on 20 September, Decathlon teamed up with the NGO Planet Patrol to launch a programme that will reward customers who clean up their neighbourhood by offering discounts on the hire of a range of sports equipment. The idea? Encourage participants to collect rubbish in their area, record it as they go along in the Planet Patrol app and take it back to the collection points. The more rubbish you collect, the bigger the discount on hire equipment.
Why it matters — For the ‘carrot’ system, which always works to make eco-friendly actions more fun, with rewards in return. Decathlon has set itself the target of collecting 5,000 items of waste in 2 weeks and, if the operation is successful, to roll it out worldwide next year.
→ Find out more about the initiative
The Red List of restaurants
In short — It's been said: Japan has a large proportion of elderly people in its population, and this is not without consequences for the restaurant sector. In the town of Takasaki, for example, the average age of independent restaurant owners is 61, with a shortage of takers, a dwindling clientele... and therefore a risk that they will close down for good. Hence the idea of a Japanese agency to create the ‘Red List of Restaurants’, the 1st gastronomic guide in the world to protect ‘endangered restaurants’. The list includes restaurants whose owners are ageing, have not found a successor and, of course, are quali', often city institutions.
Why it matters — Thanks to all the different formats used (website, book, posters, TV programme, advertising, etc.), it gave a huge spotlight (and an economic boost) to the town and its restaurants (400,000 more visitors than the previous year, an estimated $5 million in spin-offs, 30% more bookings, restaurants that have found new owners)... so much so that the Red List has been extended to other regions of Japan. This is the kind of operation that could be repeated for other threatened activities, to generate a patriotic reflex to preserve our heritage and small local craftsmen and traders.
→ Watch the case study of the campaign
Bonus — « We were unable to use the videos of the sporting events » : the creative challenge of the Paris 2024 teams
I had a coffee with Julien Fritsch, who coordinated Paris 2024's entire social media strategy, and he gave us a behind-the-scenes look at the process and the lessons he learned from it. What was interesting? Seeing all the constraints they had (not being able to use the video feed of the events, not having privileged access to the athletes, etc.) and how they got round them.
What are you doing on 10 and 11 December?
Creator Jokariz and his two partners Pierre Allary and Karim Sabba are launching the 1st edition of Paris Creator Week at Station F. This professional event will bring together 2,000 participants, 200 speakers, 100 media partners and 60 sponsors, including Spotify, Twitch, BNP Paribas, Fiverr and Amazon. Content creators and industry experts will be sharing their experiences on stage. They include: Hugo Posé (Youtubeur), Matthieu Stefani (GDIY), Hasheur (Youtubeur), Micode (Youtubeur), Caroline Mignaux (Marketing Square), Théo Lion (Coudac), Romain Cabrolier (Youtube), Guillaume Moubeche (Lemlist), Hugo Amsellem (Intuition VC), Ioana Erhan (LinkedIn)... Take advantage of a 10% discount on tickets with the code KOMANDO!
IT MAY BE A DETAIL FOR YOU, BUT...
🏡 ‘Not for sale (to women who have had breast cancer)’ — This is what appears on the fake signs designed by CNP Assurances to denounce the obstacles that still exist for women who have or have had breast cancer to buy a property... and to inform them that they can now obtain loan insurance without any additional premiums or reductions in cover linked to their cancer as soon as they have completed their treatment protocol.
🍦 The Ice Cream Project — A British designer has come up with a completely crazy concept: an ice-cream pop-up during the summer where she teams up with well-known brands such as Tropicana or Heinz so that each can come up with an atypical flavour topped with its own condiment - like a sesame ice-cream with Kikkoman soy sauce - with their iconic branding.
🛻 The bright idea — In Kansas, the government suicide prevention hotline has launched a campaign to reduce the stigma attached to seeking help for mental health problems. How do they do it? With a fleet of lorries fitted with huge neon lights bearing (real) quotes from anonymous callers, which criss-cross the busiest places, such as stadiums, in Kansas City at night throughout September.
📱 What if Apple's latest keynote really was its last? — Four creative minds have come up with a fictitious campaign for the association Halte à l'obsolescence programmée (Stop programmed obsolescence), which campaigns to extend the lifespan of products. The concept? Create in AI what a keynote speech by Tim Cook announcing ‘the first smartphone designed to last a lifetime’ would look like.
🤳🏻 Showcasing your professions on TikTok — The New York Times came up with this idea with a dedicated TikTok account (14k subscribers) to reveal what goes on behind the scenes at the editorial office and build fan loyalty.
🎧 Turning a medical scanner... into an audiobook for children — The experience of MRI scans can be at the very least frightening and at worst traumatic for many children. So Siemens Healthineers has called on writers to create audio books in which the sounds of the scanners are transformed into an integral part of the stories.
🫣 My finger in your street — It's the name of Matthieu's side project. One day, in an airport during a stopover, he saw a ‘place of worship’ sign and thought that if he put his fingers in front of the end of the word... it would be funny. And so the concept was born, giving rise to an Insta‘ account (10k subscribers), a book, merch’...
🎙️ Slam, always effective — It's rare to see videos that generate emotions, but this is the case with this slam to promote the Basque country as a destination, which combines voice-over, quality images and an effective soundtrack... and is reminiscent of the famous SNCF slam or the France TV slam for Paris 2024.
🧦 Come and talk about food in socks — Every month, journalist Ézechiel Zérah (there he is again!) organises a ‘Croque Marseille’ aperitif, inviting around 40 of Marseille's leading gastronomic figures to his home. It's a very stylish format that makes you wish you were from the South of France!
🤓 Catching up on the news as it happens: what about thinking in dashboards? — It's the idea of a former journalist: to change the logic of media sites by moving from feeds (= 1 article for each new development around a given event) to an information service (= 1 single article per event, simply updated continuously, like a dashboard). He's prototyped it and it just seems... logical (and applies just as much to political communications or brand communications: fewer articles but updated articles).
That's all for today! See you on Tuesday 15th October for the next issue!
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