“Knowing your users and putting them first is key. The SoundBite table puts users first by catering to both their love of music and their desire not to interrupt other patrons in a restaurant environment. It also doesn’t hurt that they can listen without the use of any additional hardware.” —juror Megan Meeker
“How in the… ?” —juror Drew Ungvarsky
Overview: Music is a key passion for the youth market in Africa, yet it’s incredibly hard to break into the country’s music scene. With scant adoption of services like iTunes and Shazam, record labels and radio stations still dictate what audiences hear. To address this, Ogilvy Cape Town worked with KFC South Africa to create a digital audio table inside the KFC Willows, Bloemfontein, store. Users could listen to tracks from up-and-coming artists by placing their elbows on the table’s surface and their hands on their ears. Innovative sound wave transmitters dubbed “bone technology” then passed sound waves through listeners’ arms to their ears, delivering tunes as juicy as the KFC fare before them.
•The project took five months to produce.
•All software and hardware was custom developed for this project.
•The conductive ink was produced and imported in collaboration with United Kingdom–based technology company Novalia.
Comments by Ogilvy & Mather:
Was the project part of a larger promotional campaign? “It was the start to a larger engagement platform for KFC South Africa’s urban youth market, and it helped establish a new, innovative platform for the country’s youth to consume and distribute local, unsigned artists through their social media accounts.”
Are there any other technical features you’d like to call attention to? “The tables boasted illustrations from local artists that used bespoke digital ink—as opposed to normal digital screens—thus allowing for greater durability on a surface where customers eat and often spill their KFC orders.”
What was the response? “Because of its success, KFC is planning to expand the experience nationally, and KFC China is planning to roll out our initiative. In the meantime, this single site not only delivered on its key performance indicators to create higher consumer engagement in the store, but also provided 700,000 impressions valued at more than a quarter million South African rands.”
