Ikea Covers New York with Product

May 29, 2006  by in UnCategorized   

By Home Furnishings Business in Furniture Retailing on May 2006 Last week was Design Week in New York, and Ikea, along with ad agency Deutsch, took some powerful marketing to the city streets.

According to the agency, more than 650 different experiences were offered during the five-day marketing event. Products from Ikea practically blanketed the city. Padded park benches in Union Square, oven mitts on subways, decorated bus shelters and phone kiosks, blankets on theater seats and public hammocks.

The products weren’t just placed throughout New York as advertising props, the companies wanted city dwellers to take the goods.

The blankets in theaters—based on the principle that theaters are always cold—included placements in off-Broadway’s Orpheum for a performance of “Stomp,” and the Village East movie house for a showing of “Tsotsi.” A sensual red bed was placed outside a nightclub in Manhattan’s meatpacking district.

David Rosen of Deutsch said the campaign was fun, but challenging all the same because of the unpredictability of the large-scale, unprotected product placement.