In 2012, Starbucks baristas started to write the name of the customer on the side of their cups. Yes, a bit of extra hassle. But a more personal and memorable experience in return.
Innovation
The Taco Bell app has a feature that asks you how much you are willing to spend, and creates a combination of items accordingly. A smart innovation that saves consumers having to do mental maths.
In the early days of Taco Bell, Americans didn’t know how to pronounce Taco. So the company included phonetic spelling on all menus.
Travis Scott’s partnership meal with McDonald’s was so popular that it caused supply chain issues.
When bike maker Van Moof started shipping to the US they found a lot of their bikes were being damaged by handlers en route. So they put an image of a flatscreen TV on every box, assuming handlers would care a little more about that. Suddenly shipping damages dropped by 80%.
With the goal of ‘putting glamour back in the sky’ but with insufficient money to launch a traditional advertising campaign, Virgin Airlines used the plane itself as a source of publicity; hosting a Victoria Secret’s pyjama party during a flight, and featuring an advanced screening of the HBO TV show Entourage. The constraint brought originality and freshness that a normal campaign would have lacked.
Westpac Bank flipped impulse spending on its head, creating a smartphone that allowed customers to save money with one simple click.