We’ve seen the fashion industry harness the power of Limited Releases,
Small Quantities, and Short Notice as a recipe to engage audiences around new products. But today, we’re seeing the same model recreated by other industries to harness the same spikes in interest. Travis Scott for example, to announce his Netflix Original Documentary, put a single post on instagram before making an appearance at a video store in Houston to “drop” a limited amount of VHS trailers that generated awareness, cemented community ties, deepened brand affinity, and ultimately pointed fans and followers to the actual release of the documentary which followed several days later in LA. It’s this calculated release of sensitive information in alignment with product experiences that builds a new approach to Experiential marketing, and we’re seeing the mechanic move out of just fashion into music, entertainment, and other categories who discover the power of The “Drop” experience to leverage engagement for exposure.
While in Seoul, I slid into the 2020’s.. Last week, I was lucky enough to get a personalized tour of the House of BTS from the gracious team at Big Hit Entertainment, which was a total treat. As producers of these types of experiences, I went in with my producer hat on, ready to see some cool installations, major merch displays and took note of the 2 hour long line of fans from all over the world (which apparently remains any time of day) all waiting to get in and obsess, experience, buy, cry and connect with their ARMY (the fan base) community. But what I experienced tapped into a much bigger picture of global trends and community than just sheer fandom and products. With the monumental success of BTS – the world wide supergroup (so much bigger than K-Pop, let’s just say, the massively successful, sold out stadium touring artists) whose music streams in 97 countries and have more awards and broke more records than I possibly name, singing mostly in Korean, mange to bridge a more global audience and diverse fan base, from Korea to Saudi Arabia, US to Brazil, than we have seen in decades. As hyper-connected, global citizens we now build community transcending language, age, politics, race, and religion. etc.. The export of culture as a unifying force is the cultural movement we plan to champion in the2020’s… And just wait till their tour and pop ups hit the US in 2020!