2020/2021 Winners & Shortlists

Background

Saudis live during the night. It’s a ritual passed down from ancestors who, instead, slept during the day to avoid the desert day sun. Along with that, they passed down another tradition of the night: desert camping and star gazing. McDonald’s KSA decided to be the first fast food restaurant to get a license to open all night…But since we were the first, no one was used to looking for an open restaurant LATE at night. Our brief was to get people’s attention and announce that McDonald’s was open all night.

Describe the creative idea (40% of vote)

Introducing the McFries Belt, The McSundae Nebula and the Big Maccer. Each visual was carefully crafted to retain the shape of the stars in the sky while seamlessly integrating the McDonald’s products as lit anchor points. The visuals clearly announce that McDonald’s was open all night, since we could see the products in the night sky. The visuals were used as instore posters and posters on the streets, driving people to download the star hunt app to take part in the promotion.

Describe the execution (40% of vote)

Our strategy was simple, we created posters that would catch the attention of our demographics. The demographics that use the McDonald’s app are the younger generation (under 35) and they are the ones who are staying up most of the night. All we had to do was make sure that our idea was not a simple promotion but something they could engage and interact with, hence the augmented reality star hunt. The McDonald’s star hunt augmented reality mobile promotion took 2 weeks to code and build. It took 30 seconds to update on our 200,000 users phones. And that’s the only media placement we used. That placement on its on got us on opening night 20,000 visitors (10% of the app users).

List the results (20% of vote)

On the 1st night of opening: • 200,000 McDonalds lovers reached • 12% increase in sales • 20,000 people came to McDonald’s • Campaign cost covered in the 1st hour • 1900% return on campaign investment You can say McDonald’s KSA became the star of the Saudi night.