The Folkoperan Opera House: Unsuccessful Ticket Sampling [image]

Credits & Description:

Title: Unsuccessful Ticket Sampling
Agency: Ingo
Brand: Folkoperan
Country: Sweden
Entrant Company: Ingo, Stockholm
Advertising Agency: Ingo, Stockholm
Production Company: Ingo, Stockholm
Additional Company: Aol/Beon, Stockholm
Executive Creative Director: Björn Ståhl (Ingo)
Planner: Julia Blomquist (Ingo)
Creative Director: Josefine Richards (Ingo)
Agency Producer: Pia Dueholm (Ingo)
Art Director: Max Hultberg (Ingo)
Design Director: Kerstin Engberg (Ingo)
Account Director: Marie Klinte (Ingo)
Account Manager: Mia Melani (Ingo)
Film Production: Georg Bungard (Georg Bungard)
Film Editor: Robin Gunther (Robin Gunther)
Content Distributer: Nina Rehnmark (Aol)
Content Distributor: Alexandra Thomas (Aol)
Final Art: Maria Dubeck (Ingo)
Synopsis:
Folkoperan is an opera house in Stockholm famous for themes that highlight social issues. In their contemporary opera ”God Disguised” Romani migrants perform on stage to illustrate how exposed groups are ignored in our society. Romani migrants are a nomadic ethnic group. Many come to Sweden, to beg for money, as their only chance of survival. But even in friendly Sweden they are invisible.With the opera Folkoperan wanted to help Romani migrants become visible.But how do you promote an opera about something people do their best to ignore?
Relevancy:
With a simple change of a cardboard message we proved our point. This was a one-to-one activity in 2 parts. The first part was meant to be unsuccessful to become successful in the second part.
Execution:
On the morning of the 21st of January, several of the Romani migrants performing in the show re-wrote their cardboard signs to tell about their performance and that they had free tickets to give away. They stood where you would expect to find them; by the subway, outside the grocery store and on many other of Stockholm’s busiest locations.The whole day they tried to get the attention of the people of Stockholm. Thousands passed by and ignored the message. Not until 12 hours later, one person stopped and read the sign – finally 2 tickets could be given away. The full day activity was documented with hidden camera and uploaded on Facebook.
Outcome:
The opera became the most talked about in Folkoperan's history.102 million media impressions.Record sales: 84% of tickets sold at full prize. (2 extra shows). Even the King and the Queen made their first ever visit to Folkoperan, to show their support to the cause.The invisible became visible. Romani migrants were seen for the first time, on the stage, and in media. Two months later Sweden decided to extend their economic aid for the Romani migrants.
Campaign Description:
The tickets were given away for free - We asked the Romani migrants performing in the opera to give away the tickets for free. Instead of the usual text on their cardboard, you could now read that they would be in the show and that they had 2 free tickets as a thank for seeing the message.As expected the ticket sampling was unsuccessful. After 12 hours on 10 locations, only 2 tickets were given away. Then we posted the video about it on Facebook and suddenly everyone knew about it. The invisible became visible.
Strategy:
Opera is an artform in decline. It's very rare that an opera gets attention on social media platsforms. Because of the low interest in and ignorance of the Romani migrants we needed to do something that would create a lot of awareness and start the conversation.The one-to-one ticket sampling was, as expected, at first unsuccessful. The usually culturally seeking people of Stockholm just passed by the message. Until the video about it was posted on Facebook.The uploaded video got the target audience to recognize their own behavior and question it. And we offered them a second chance to see them - on the stage of Folkoperan. But this time they had to pay for the tickets.