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May 2006 - Strategy Magazine
Up front

Solo gets the party started

by Lisa D'Innocenzo
page 10

Want youth to covet your brand? Then be exclusive. Solo Mobile has partnered with urban lifestyle/entertainment magazine Vice to hold 100 parties in 100 nights.

Between May and September, the two brands will host young folks, LDA to 24, at trendy stores in 80 markets across Canada, including cities in B.C., Alberta, Ontario and Quebec. Each shop will be closed and turned into a licensed establishment on the night in question.

Jeff Roach, managing director of youth marketing at Toronto-based consultancy Youthography, which helped set up the deal on Solo Mobile's behalf, says visitors to viceland.com/100/100, can request invites, but that only the "coolest people in every market will get into this party." Invites will go out to members of Vice's database, and to the shops' VIP lists, as well as to folks who sign up online.

He says specifically reaching out to the older segment of Solo Mobile's 13-24 demo makes sense, because "young adults are key influencers, and [appealing to them] is important for any brand in the youth space. So this is a party designed exclusively to reach them, and that has a real cool factor that gets noticed." The objective, he says, is simply to get Solo Mobile's "walkie-talkie, free text, no contract message out to [the target]."

At press time, the BIC lighters brand had also signed on as a partner, while deals with other sponsors were being finalized.

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