Here’s the second installment of our 2013 agency holiday card guide. The first is here. If I missed out something great, email me and I’ll add it to the list.
JWT
This year, JWT Atlanta used a 3-D printer, a RaspberryPi microcomputer and a bit of woodworking to hand-build two WiFi-enabled, blog-posting Holiday Houses, or JWT “Ho-Ho-Holiday Houses.” Using a motion detector, the houses recognize when a visitor has stepped in front of them, and the person is surprised with a random holiday greeting from one of the Dallas elves. It then snaps a quick picture of the person’s reaction and posts it to the JWT Holiday House Tumblr blog to spread some holiday Internet cheer. The photo is then tagged to the holiday greeter, connecting the “greeter” in Dallas with the “greetee” in Atlanta and NYC.
Mullen
This is fun: Thanks to a “patented device created in-house by some guy in Mullen’s IT department,” the Hater Translator turns mean-spirited blog comments into messages of hope. ‘Tis the season of good will, after all.
DigitasLBI
For its holiday card, DigitasLBI figured that everyone loves a good cocktail and created Get Blitzen, a customized cocktail recipe machine. Noticing I was visiting the site from the sleepy London suburb of New Malden, the site noted that a winter mojito might help spice things up. I think it might be right.
Bob’s Your Uncle
Canadian shop Bob’s Your Uncle is pretty sure Toronto’s Mayor, Rob Ford, is on the naughty list this year, so it’s helping Santa out and delivering coal to Toronto City Hall on his behalf. Anyone can contribute to the coal pile at RobFordCoal.com, and for every piece of coal, Bob’s Your Uncle will donate $1 to help children in need. Luckily, the agency set a limit of CA$5,000, however, because over a million pieces had been submitted on the site as of yesterday morning.
Tribal Worldwide
This year, Tribal created The Tribal Table, which promises to turn photos of users’ holiday meals into food for hungry children. Users must download an app, photograph their holiday meal, and for every photo shared, it will donate a meal to The Lunchbox Fund.
Iris Worldwide
Aiming to create a Yuletide yardstick of who’s being naughty and who’s being nice on Twitter this holiday season, Iris created Seasons Tweetings, which tracks the holiday spirit across the U.S. in real time. The resulting data are entertaining.
Deutsch NY
Worried that clients will miss their “Deutschers” over the holiday period, Deutsch NY created these print-your-own holiday buddies. No 3-D printer is needed here — they’re made of paper and ready to print and assemble.
Winsper
After a long year of client work, Winsper took the holiday card opportunity to air some grievances. The result is this “12 pains of Christmas” story told through the eyes of any marketer who has ever worked at an agency. Let’s hope clients see the funny side.
More in Marketing
Hyve Group buys the Possible conference, and will add a meeting element to it in the future
Hyve Group, which owns such events as ShopTalk and FinTech Meetup, has agreed to purchase Beyond Ordinary Events, the organizing body behind Possible.
Agencies and marketers point to TikTok in the running to win ‘first real social Olympics’
The video platform is a crucial part of paid social plans this summer, say advertisers and agency execs.
Where Kamala Harris and Donald Trump stand on big tech issues
The next U.S. president is going to have a tough job of reining in social media companies’ dominance and power enough to satisfy lawmakers and users, while still encouraging free speech, privacy and innovation.