Client: A24 Films
When A24 first released stills and a logline for A Ghost Story, it was hard to pinpoint what the film was about. Was it a horror movie? A comedy? Why was Casey Affleck walking around in a bed sheet? Spoiler Alert - he’s dead.
At its core, the film is a deep, existential look at human relationships and how those evolve after death. It contemplates ideas of human existence, memories and generates an intimate look at what we leave behind after we move on with our lives.
Our task was to extract themes from this very dense, heady movie and make them accessible to the people. After brainstorming collaboratively with A24, we found our solution by merely changing one letter in the film’s title - A Ghost Store was born.
The big idea was to position the film’s iconic bed sheet as a product and create a retail experience that allowed users to learn about and sample the product for themselves. This way, they’d gain an understanding of what it meant to “put on the sheet” and be able to form their own ideas about the implications that came with.
From a production standpoint, this manifested in many forms. An influencer mailer drove to a digital experience site which cross-promoted a real-life pop-up shop in New York. Targeted social content and banners were also created to engage the community. I was personally responsible for producing the digital experience + product shoot as well as overseeing the design of the influencer mailer.
We wanted to build a product site but had no images of the product. In the span of 3 days, we acquired the sheet prop from A24, put together a crew and booked a stage for a 1-day product shoot that yielded us all the material we’d need.
To kick off the campaign, we needed to make key press and influencers aware that there was an online destination. We worked with A24 to generate gift cards that directed recipients to aghost.store, our digital experience site where their cards could be redeemed for the actual product.
Our intention was for the digital experience to look and feel like a high-end online storefront. Our featured product was the bed sheet and as users navigated through the site, they could learn more about the deeper meaning beneath the sheet. Site copy felt like traditional product lingo but featured double entendre nodding to the existential.
One of the site’s key features was the ability to sample the product. To do this, users simply had to hold down their mouse (or finger on mobile devices) and watch as the site was transformed. We applied a custom Web-GL texture that was reactive to the user’s mouse and gave the illusion of what it’d feel like to view the world from beneath the sheet. We took this opportunity to showcase clips from the film, allowing the user to view scenes from the main character’s POV.
After sampling the product, the user could decide whether or not they wanted to purchase it. Only here, the sheet couldn’t be paid for with money but rather time. The price - 8 minutes and 19 seconds of your day. The payoff - a chance to win a limited edition sheet mailed straight to your door.
While we focused on the digital experience, A24 leveraged our design + messaging into a physical pop up shop in NYC. Visiting the storefront afforded participants a similar experience where they could answer questions about their existence and then try on a sheet of their own, snapping pics and sharing along the way.
We set up a livestream for the pop up and broadcast it to interested users on the website. Store location info was also present, allowing digital users to seek out the physical store if they were interested in visiting.
In addition to a variety of film-centric creative content, our team produced numerous store-specific paid ads that were rolled out on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Each ad highlighted different features of the sheet and pointed users directly to the experience site.
During the campaign, we received a little backlash from frustrated users who visited the site hoping to get a sheet but being denied after multiple tries. To alleviate their concerns, we developed social creative that alerted the most engaged fans when new inventory came in.
The Shoot
Shooting the prop was easy enough but assembling the crew and location on such an accelerated timeline was tricky. A lot of favors and a lot of amazing individuals helped us pull off this key component of the campaign.
Mobile Performance
Making such a robust digital experience mobile friendly required lots of planning from the start. Things like Web-GL optimization and video behaviors were key considerations that were taken into account when strategizing around design and site architecture.
Limited Sheets
This was a big one and something that we did not foresee being problematic until we were live. Making users spend nearly 9 minutes of their time without a guarantee that they’d actually receive the product frustrated a lot of people. We had to be nimble with our messaging and make it clear that inventory was limited.
Given the size of the film, press was a huge indicator of success. The campaign gained coverage in AdWeek, The LA Times, Indiewire and more. We were also fortunate enough to win several industry awards including a Grand Clio Entertainment Award, FWA Site of the Day and Awwwards Site of the Day.
Credits
Agency: Watson DG
Executive Creative Director: Fernando Ramirez
Creative Director: Hleb Marholin
Associate Creative Director: Arin Delaney
Designer: Yuri Lence
Developers: William Chen, Florian Morel, John Iacoviello
Editors: Ryan Shelton, Cheng Lei Wu
Producers: Greg Meltzer, Max Simon