Miami’s Winter Music Conference Hotel Takeover Scene

This week, Joss takes a look at the hotel takeover scene surrounding the 29th Winter Music Conference in Miami.

A notorious breeding ground for brand experiences and experiential marketing campaigns, all sorts of events popped up, from The Surfcomber’s pool party, which attracted more than a thousand people each day, to the Red Bull Guest House at Gale South Beach.

The Red Bull Guest House made for an energetic brand experience with everything from ping pong tables to pool floats bearing the logo. By immersing the brand into the experience, Red Bull got people talking about its event and brand, as well as making sure it would appear in plenty of holiday snaps.

 

Red Bull even went as far as to host its own pop-up radio station in the Red Bull Guest House. Over the four days of the conference, the Guest House hosted the beats of more than 35 DJs including Giorgio Moroder. The party was not to be missed and even Paris Hilton and P Diddy stopped by.
 


The stand out experiential element of this hotel takeover for me is the fact that Red Bull offered free haircuts for male guests and comp manicures for female guests.

 

There was also an interactive photobooth which could text you your pics, and this was a nice touch to the campaign. 

Guests could also tuck into seared wild arctic char prepared by The Traktor Cookery.

 

Red Bull have never been known to do things by half measures, and the takeover will no doubt get people talking, and give their brand wings.

It might not have the shock impact of prankvertising, or the technokudos of virtual reality, but these hotel takeovers make the most of an existing event and use the ‘cool by association’ springboard to create their own memorable brand experiences.
 
The takeovers remind me of all the experiential that popped up at the Oscars this year; another event for which brands whole heartedly embraced creating brand experiences.

Joss Davidge is managing partner of BEcause, an award winning brand experience agency which has been helping brands become more tried, tested and talked about for over 20 years.