Challenge

Wonda Coffee is champion of Ready-To-Drink coffee. Having been in market for almost 10 years, the brand has a massive following.

  • It quickly captured the 2nd position in market within 6 months of launch.
  • One SKU which contributed to growth is Wonda Extra Presso, with a stronger “body” and “character” due to the roasting process of its coffee beans.
  • Wonda Extra Presso has been based on the communication of “Extra Strong” or “Stay Strong”. Crucially, Wonda Extra Presso delivers stronger taste than competitors, and is not a “double shot”.

 Having dominated the convenience and service station channel, Wonda also wanted to bring its positioning to life, giving its young target market a unique experience.

  1. Drive reach and awareness of product’s claim with younger audience.
  2. Increase sales for Wonda Coffee in Q4, which is traditionally a low sales quarter.
  3. Create brand excitement, using horror as a lever to get consumers to drink more Wonda to understand the proposition of Stay Strong. Provide a premium experience, in keeping with the personality of the Wonda brand.  

The target audiences, Gen Y and Gen Z, urban, are its core consumers. These audiences genuinely look forward to pop culture events and are, in large part, extroverted.

  1. NEED FOR EXCITEMENT: Having still recovering from being cooped up indoors for the duration of the pandemic, the target audience wanted to experience the world again. But the pandemic had also changed expectations: they sought new experiences that drove “never before” feelings. Over 45% of this audience (urban Malaysians aged 18-35) actively sought out new experiences on a monthly basis. They epitomized YOLO (You Only Live Once).
  2. LACK OF ENGAGING HORROR PROPOSITION: Horror movies are a very popular film genre with our audience, as indeed with all Malaysians. While the masses enjoy slapstick horror and jump frights, our WONDA COFFEE audience seeks something more discerning and elevated. There was a shortage of such opportunities, and as a result consumers would end up at home, indoors, watching Netflix and OTT for their horror fix. Furthermore, on traditional media including TV, October is dominated by horror, thanks to Halloween. We needed to get our target audience to leave the comfort of their living rooms, come outdoors and consume our convenience-oriented product, on the go, thus experiencing Stay Strong.

Solution

To bring the proposition of Stay Strong to life, we needed a challenge that would enthrall excitement-seeking young Malaysians.

  • We would run a horror movie marathon from midnight onwards (“The witching hour”) and challenge Gens Y and Z to dare to watch this horror smashfest.
  • To survive this insane test, drinking Wonda coffee was essential. Wonda’s caffeine kick and smooth flavour would help our target audience Stay Strong and showcase our product in action with thrilling cinema content.
  • Inspired by the hallmarks of effective execution in a great horror movie, we decided to mirror those for our Wonda Stay Strong campaign. Our creative expression on radio, on ground , online and in cinema mirrored the most successful aspects and tropes of a great horror movie.
  1. Visual scares: We engineered sightings of ghostly apparitions across the Klang Valley: at KLCC, Bangsar and even MBO cinema. These sightings in video or image form created buzz on social media platforms of the 2 radio stations and on news and gossip sites. These sightings garnered millions of views and thousands of shares online. In an agile, omnichannel approach, these digital contents became amplified by discussion amongst radio announcers.
  2. Audio chills: We used the power of radio to create audio chills and spills, like any good horror movie used sound effectively.
  3. On ground mayhem: Remember the panic that ensues in a movie when the zombies attack, or the infected creatures break free and create a frenzy? We used radio cruisers to reach out to consumers and get them to sign up for the Wonda Stay Strong Movie Marathon. Across a period of 2 weeks, we registered 67% more participants in excess of what we had targeted.
  4. Rumours and scary stories: Just like a good horror movie has scenes with news of past crimes and rumours of danger, we used the power of content talksets create further atmosphere of anticipation and chills.
  5. Graveyard décor: Finally, the cinema hall was decked up like a graveyard, to add further spine-tingling elements. The only way to get through this overwhelming overload of over 6 hours of horror was to Stay Strong with Wonda coffee.
  6. The Challenge of Stay Strong in the cinema hall: consumers had to keep awake throughout the entire duration of the 6 hour movie marathon. Falling asleep would mean a disqualification from a prize pool of money.
  7. Live roaming ghosts: During the movie marathon – there would be “live” ghosts roaming in the cinema to jump-scare patrons. If consumers screamed, they would be disqualified as well.

 All these conditions served to re-emphasise and imprint the “Stay Strong” proposition in the minds of consumers. These unique executional techniques helped create mass interest, discussion online and built up a great platform for us to demonstrate our Stay Strong proposition. From the inception of the campaign, the Halloween Movie Marathon, the campaign was rapidly executed with precise planning in a total time of about 4 weeks.

Results

Our campaign was iconic in multiple ways because it was the FIRST OF ITS KIND HOROR MOVIE MARATHON. In media and business terms, it was highly successful.

  1. STRONG REACH: The campaign achieved a strong reach, aggregated across all platforms, offline and online. This was achieved effectively at a highly media efficient and cost-effective rate. Through multiple social media updates, the total social media reach alone was impressive. This was despite a small budget, and demonstrates the power of this creative idea.
  2. HIGH FREQUENCY: Over our four week campaign, millions of people heard the WONDA Stay Strong message on ERA and HITZ .
  3. DROVE SALES: Most importantly for the Wonda Coffee brand, sales rose in Q4 2022, beyond projections. 
  4. BRAND PERCEPTION AND AFFINITY: Perception of brand as differentiated and stronger than competitors as well as brand affinity also rose accordingly. 
  5. SPEED TO MARKET: This campaign is a watershed in Wonda Coffee’s history: because of its speed to market and its effective results.

WONDA Stay Strong Horror Movie Marathon proved that the brand could innovate and be relevant to Gen Y and Gen Z in a profitable manner, against larger competitors. And that’s a real feel good ending to our horror story!