When it comes to SXSW 2008, I’ve seen a lot of the typical brand promotion strategies. We’ve seen the posters. We’ve seen the bottle replicas serving as posters. Every type of beverage has a wrapped vehicle (the Monster energy truck I thought was a little different and appropriate for the brand), and if brands don’t have any of the aforementioned, they have street teams to hand out the product. Other than the interactive lounges, I’m a little bored.
So where’s the sidewalk chalk? This is what I really wanted to know when I walked down 6th St. at noon today. Knowing that downtown largely becomes barricaded and patrons are able to walk in the street, I would think that sidewalk chalk would be an absolute hit! 6th is probably wide enough to fit three Weiner Mobiles at least, and that could be a lot of room for chalking your brand onto the ground. I can’t be positive of the cost differences between synthetic posters and an artist with great chalk skills, but I imagine they might not be too far off, making sidewalk works of art quite possible. And who knows, maybe chalk isn’t the only option. I actually saw one solitary piece of sidewalk advertising and that was a poster somehow attached to the ground. There’s nothing to say that posters can’t be put on the ground too, and maybe you could put a great creative spin on it. Maybe it’s just me, but I see a lot of cool potential. So all I can say is, when other brands are looking high, maybe next year other brands should look low.
Funny thing about the sidewalk chalk.. I had planned on doing some myself at SXSW (along with riding my motorized cooler around) but a friend from Austin was telling me about how during the elections a lil back, folks from austin were arrested and held overnight for writing VOTE with sidewalk chalk all around austin. Kinda bummed me out.. but I think the cooler did it’s job!