Store opening campaign: how to tell an arrival

A store opening campaign in a shopping center tells an arrival: the brand that appears, the space that changes and the day it opens. It works better in stages, with a teaser that builds anticipation, the opening and the aftermath, and with pieces also designed for the shopping center's own screens, where the audience that can walk in already is.

Why an opening is told as an arrival

An opening competes with everything already happening in the shopping center: other openings, promotions, retail dates. A piece that only says "we're open" adds to that noise. A piece that tells an arrival gives the news a beginning, a central moment and an aftermath.

The arrival is a code the audience understands quickly. Something appears, gets closer, lands. It works for an international brand returning to the country and for a brand adding a new store, because in both cases the story is the same: someone who was not there now is.

The opening is one of the pieces a shopping center asks for most; the others are in the guide to video for shopping centers.

The three stages of an opening campaign

An opening campaign works better when it is planned in stages. Each one has a different objective and, therefore, different pieces:

• Anticipation. The teaser announces that something is coming without showing everything. Its job is for people to know the date and want to go.

• Opening. The main piece tells the arrival at the largest scale of the campaign. It is the one that gets shared on opening day.

• Aftermath. Once the opening is over, the communication changes tone: where the store is, what can be found inside, why come back.

The MINISO campaign at Unicenter was planned this way, in two phases on a vertical LED screen: first the identity and the characters appear little by little; after the opening, the same universe changes its hierarchy to say that the store is now open.

What the brand tells and what the shopping center tells

An opening has two protagonists with overlapping interests. The brand wants to be recognized as it is in any market. The shopping center wants the news to be seen as part of its offer and its calendar.

Both can coexist in the same piece. For Mango's arrival at Alto Palermo, the brand had already been telling its arrivals in other markets, such as Uruguay, with the code of something that lands and announces that the brand is here. The piece took that language and brought it to the shopping center, with the bag as the protagonist and the landing on Alto Palermo's main facade as the ending. The result is recognizable as Mango and, at the same time, belongs to the place.

When the shopping center also needs each campaign to add to its own brand, the criteria are in how to look after a shopping center's brand in its campaigns.

The shopping center's screens as the first medium of an opening

The audience for an opening is already in the building. The shopping center's own screens, such as LED bridges, totems and columns, are the medium closest to the store that is opening and the one seen by the people who can walk in.

Those pieces are not made by cropping the social media video. Each format has its proportion, its reading distance and, often, it works without sound. Details in the guide to content for LED screens.

At MINISO Unicenter, the screen worked as a point of contact before and after the opening. A single format accompanied the whole campaign.

Four published openings and the idea behind each one

SÃO at Abasto Shopping. The opening was told as an air operation: a helicopter carries a cargo with the brand and, when it opens, a shower of croissants travels across the city until it reaches the Abasto. The commercial news was presented as an event.

Mango at Alto Palermo. Mango's return to Argentina, told with the arrival code the brand uses in other markets and a bag that lands on the shopping center.

MINISO at DOT Baires Shopping. MINISO's second store in Argentina, a 600 m² flagship. The idea is that the brand's universe starts arriving at DOT: bags, products and characters appear over the shopping center and then the story goes into the store.

MINISO at Unicenter. A two-phase campaign for a vertical LED screen, from teaser to opening, with a system that changed its message without changing its universe.

In all four, the opening is told as a story with a central moment, and the brand is part of that story. For the broader context of how to produce retail content at the pace it calls for today, there is content for retail and shopping centers. Opening pieces are part of FeedGuru's services.

Frequently asked questions

How far in advance should an opening campaign start?

It is worth starting when the opening date is confirmed, because the teaser has to be able to say when. Before that, it is enough to have the idea and the formats defined, so production does not start at the last minute. The exact lead time depends on the brand, the shopping center and how many pieces the campaign includes, so it is worth agreeing on it in the brief.

What pieces does an opening need?

As a base, a teaser that builds anticipation, a main piece for opening day and pieces for afterwards that say where the store is and what can be found inside. Each one usually needs versions for social media and for the shopping center's screens. With a strong idea and a visual system defined from the start, moving from one stage to the next does not mean redoing the campaign.

Who makes the campaign, the brand or the shopping center?

It depends on the agreement between the parties. Sometimes the brand commissions it, sometimes the shopping center, and sometimes the shopping center supports the brand in its launch, as DOT Baires Shopping did with the MINISO opening. What matters is that there is a single idea: the brand needs to be recognized as it is in any market, and the shopping center needs the news to be seen as part of its offer.

How is visibility sustained after opening day?

With a campaign stage designed for afterwards. The shopping center's own screens help guide visitors to the store and remind them that it is now open. At MINISO Unicenter, the same screen went from "Coming soon" to "Now open" while keeping the visual universe, and kept working as a point of contact after the opening.

SÃO, Mango and the two MINISO openings can be seen in full among all the projects.