The ‘Headline News’ Cup Sleeve

A marketing campaign story of how real-time package printing grew readership. Video included for those who prefer watching over reading. =)

"Gulf News, the UAE's leading English daily newspaper, wanted to reach even more readers and convert them into subscribers. Our target was to gain 1.5% more subscribers, help promote their twitter channel and increase traffic to the Gulf News website by at least 25%.

Consumption habit suggests that people read newspapers while having their morning cup of coffee.Tim Hortons is one of our clients in the UAE and they serve 35-50,000 coffees per month, per outlet. Realising its untapped potential, we decided to create a campaign around them to meet our target.

Since fresh news goes well with fresh coffee, we adapted the coffee cup sleeve of Tim Hortons, a global coffee chain, into an advertising medium and we created The ‘Headline News’ Cup Sleeve.

Timing is everything. So we interacted with our readers when they normally read the newspaper — when they enjoy their freshly brewed coffee. The ‘Headline News’ Cup Sleeve allowed us to be the first throughout the day to deliver breaking news to potential subscribers and make a meaningful connection with them."

THE RESULTS• Until now, over 1,440 headline tweets have been printed on more than 840,000 coffee cups.• More than 2,900 new Gulf News Twitter followers in the first two weeks of the campaign launch.• The traffic on the Gulf News website grew by 41%.• Subscription’s up by 2.8% so far.• We’re rolling out this project in Tim Hortons outlets across the UAE and in 14 new outlets soon to be opened.

Designed by Y&R Dubai

Chief Creative Officer: Shahir Zag

Creative Director/Copywriter: Shahir Zag

Creative Director/Art Director: Joseph Bihag

The short URL and QR code on the sleeve direct users to the Gulf News website where they can read the full story behind the tweet.