The MediaVest Emirates Vertical Garden Billboard has generated R700 000 of PR exposure on various platforms, 25-million blog visits, 106811 Tweets and 469373 Facebook likes. Ensuring innovation on behalf of its client Emirates Airlines, MediaVest, in collaboration with NU Venture, Tractor Outdoor and Draft FCB, conceptualised the vertical wall garden in 2011. Grown on a traditional billboard, it was a first in South Africa constructed solely from wood and vegetation.
The strategy saw a non-descript space in Kloof Street, Cape Town, transformed into a living breathing piece of art, 6m (high) and 12m (wide).
MediaVest Business Unit Manager Robert Notrica said, ‘Although it’s regionally based, the campaign has become a talking point around the country and across the web. Innovation was the key to breaking through the barriers and reaching consumers in the ruthlessly competitive and cluttered airline industry.’
Cape Town’s ‘environmental consciousness’ offered a receptive audience to the brand that ensured an environmentally friendly approach in its communication practices and business.
‘The plan was to engage ‘green conscious’ consumers by showing them how Emirates connects the world through the use of environmentally friendly material and ‘grows’ its message over time,’ said Notrica.
The billboard was designed by Draft FCB with the aim of representing the earth and the contrasting vegetation colours represented the oceans over which Emirates flies. All of the continents that Emirates flies to where also represented and LED lights were used to highlight its destinations.
‘The Billboard not only offered consumers a new experience, every week as it grew, but the look and feel changed from day to night with a visually startling LED World Map which lit up the trendy Kloof Street night spot,’ said Notrica.
