Jeff Bennett's Blog

Back in 2003 I led several innovative marketing campaigns for Dunkin Donuts and Reebok.  Two of these campaigns involved human billboards.  I think I can say these were the two first widely covered human billboard campaigns.

The Dunkin Donuts human billboard was staged at the NCAA March Madness outside and inside the then Fleet Center in Boston.  We had what seemed a sea of Humans acting as billboards for Dunkin Donuts.  It caused some stir at the game for Dunkin Donuts, but what was best about the campaign was the coverage it got on page one of  ESPN.com during the game, the following day on front page of the Boston Globe Business section and then the pick up in scores of other trade rags and newspapers.  We also did a series of radio interviews with stations across the U.S. on sports talk radio that offered further reach.

The Reebok human billboard campaign was staged at the Boston Marathon the next month.  We staged a rally in Reebok headquarters in suburban Boston in the morning with a legion of Human billboards along with Terry Tate who was at the time playing the role as the “Office Linebacker” in Reebok spots.  We then brought Terry Tate to the famous “Heartbreak Hill” on the Boston Marathon course with our human billboards to promote Reebok and their brand.  The Boston Marathon official sponsor was Adidas that year.  Under the radar this nifty human billboard again scored big buzz at the event and bigger buzz through the media with TV coverage during the race, on the 6 and 11 o’clock news in Boston and again scores of pick up through other news outlets and trade journals.

Both of these campaigns were even documented in a marketing text book for fun, creative and high impact gorilla marketing campaigns.  The execution of these campaigns was the creative brainchild of Ben Sturner, one of the hardest working men I know in the sports marketing industry.

They say that imitation is the best form of flattery.  It was great to see the recent NY Times article highlighting a recent human billboard campaign for New Zealand Air.   An article in the NY Times is right up there.

With all of our social media networks in place today – there is no doubt that a very powerful campaign could be contrived and executed around an event that is then tied to social media.  Hmmmm…lets see what we can whip up.