Drury Logo
Drury was tasked with managing three key pillars of the campaign: the announcement, the creation and media amplification of the Build Stunt, and the store opening event.
Lego Store Dublin opens.

This campaign won Best Consumer Public Relations Award at the 2023 PRCA Awards.

ASK
LEGO was opening its first Irish store in Dublin in summer of 2022 and tasked Drury with managing the announcement while creating ample consumer and media awareness. Drury was tasked with managing three key pillars of the campaign: the announcement, the creation and media amplification of the Build Stunt, and the store opening event. The activity began in February 2022 with the store opening taking place at the end of August.

APPROACH
The brand coming to a new market allowed us to create an innovative and bespoke communications strategy build on thorough market research, audience insights, and stakeholder analysis. Based on our research, we developed an approach centred around hardworking media relations, an Irish-centric stunt, an engaging media partnership with relevant media partners, and an immersive and captivating store opening complete with VIP visits for media, influencers and stakeholders.

Over the course of seven months, we expertly manged our three-pronged approach to create mass awareness and build considerable excitement amongst consumers and media, ensuring all of Ireland knew a LEGO store was coming to Dublin.

To ensure the first phase of the campaign – the announcement – was a success, we conducted considerable market research, an in-depth review of the media and stakeholder landscape, and an audience analysis including Irish families, the Irish AFOL (Adult Fans of LEGO) community, and tourists visiting Dublin in Summer 2022. We created an engaging and informative press release announcing the opening of the store and liaised with key targets, based on our extensive research, resulting in blanket coverage across Irish media.

To continue momentum and consumer excitement ahead of the opening, we organised an Irish-centric LEGO activation for the second phase of the campaign, complete with an engaging media partnership with Today FM’s Dermot and Dave. To further build anticipation around the store opening, we created the Poolbeg Towers out of LEGO and featured them in two notable locations on the activation day – Sandymount Strand, home of the actual Poolbeg Towers, and South King Street, just around the corner from the store itself. We utilised our media partnership with Dermot and Dave to drive pedestrian views and interactions with the creation, encouraging the hashtag #LEGOStoreDublin. To further amplify the LEGO partnership, Dermot and Dave went head-to-head to create their own LEGO structure using basic LEGO Bricks and asked their listeners to vote for their favourite creation for a chance to win tickets to the VIP Event held at the LEGO store the day before the store opening.

The third and final phase of the campaign was centred around the store opening and included three VIP events held a day in advance of the store opening as well as unmatched amplification on the opening day itself. Exclusive invites were issued to media and stakeholders, influencers and the AFOL community ahead of the VIP events, which included a press briefing and interview opportunities, refreshments, and branded goodies, and gave attendees the chance to explore all the store had to offer before the doors were opened to the public the next day. We relied on our hardworking media relations skills to ensure key media received interviews with LEGO representatives and were present for the ribbon cutting ceremony – which feature LEGO super fan and cancer survivor Finn Ryan cutting the LEGO ribbon. The opening ceremony created an immersive LEGO experience that brought the brand to life with an Irish twist including Irish dancers and the LEGO mascot. We worked with event management company Miller & Lamb to ensure safety and crowd control, and continued our involvement throughout the opening weekend as excitement and consumer interested continued far past the initial opening day.

OUTCOME
• The overall results of the three-pronged approached included 285 pieces of coverage across Broadcast, Print and Online channels, as well as 195 pieces of social coverage from key stakeholders, media and influencers.
• LEGO was also the number 1 trending topic on Twitter in Ireland on the morning of the store opening – with 21,000 tweets mentioning the brand.
• The combined total impressions from the campaign came to 41,519,212.
• Throughout the campaign we engaged with a number of key stakeholders, a variety of media focused on business, tourism, parenting and family, and features, and a host of well-known influencers in the lifestyle, entertainment and parenting space.
• Most importantly, we created an incredibly successful launch built on increased public awareness and excitement around the brand.