Music festivals have increasingly become a testing ground for brand activations.
There are a plethora of ways for brands to show up at these popular events, and much competition on-site. For the denim brand Wrangler, that meant not just having a presence at Stagecoach itself, but in all the peripheral moments around the festival.
Wrangler’s Stagecoach strategy included strategically placed out-of-home advertisements, including billboards along the highway leading to the Coachella Valley and signage at the baggage claim at the Palm Springs Airport. Wrangler also sponsored a nearby event, Desert Rodeo, a horse- and bull-riding festival held on the same weekend, with extensive signage and exclusive rights to denim merchandise.
Wrangler’s approach of focusing on the moments leading up to the festival contrasts with brands that have focused most of their festival marketing activations at the events themselves, like Gap which hosted an immersive hub and custom hoodie shop at Coachella this year.
The brand’s 360-degree strategy at Stagecoach was built around Wrangler’s higher-profile presence at the festival. Headliners Lainey Wilson and Cody Johnson are both Wrangler brand ambassadors and wore Wrangler during their performances. There was also an official Wrangler pop-up shop at the festival featuring pieces from Wrangler’s most recent Western wear collection. Post Malone, another performer, has no official relationship with Wrangler but organically wore head-to-toe Wrangler at the event.
“All of the out-of-home advertisements were placed by our in-house team,” said Holly Wheeler, vp of global marketing for Wrangler’s parent company Kontoor Brands. “The entire weekend is an experience, and we didn’t want to just slap our logo as a sponsor and leave it at that. The goal was to show up in all these surprising little ways around the festival, as well.”
Wrangler’s strategy also extended online, where it placed ads on Spotify playlists featuring some of the artists who would be performing at Stagecoach. The ads featured Lainey Wilson talking about her collaborative collection with Wrangler released last year. High-traffic playlists on Spotify, like “This Is Lainey Wilson,” “This Is Cody Johnson,” “Coastal Cowgirl” and “All New Country,” also featured Wrangler ads in the lead-up to the festival to target customers preparing to attend.
“I personally use the ad-supported version of Spotify so I can listen to the ads,” Wheeler said. “A lot of listeners use the ad-supported tier, and our own analysis has shown a pretty massive return on streaming audio ad placements. That’s including display ads and visual ads in the app, not just the audio ads.”
Spotify has over 400 million listened on its free ad-supported tier. Spotify’s own data shows that one in five ad listeners converts.
Kontoor, Wrangler’s parent company, is in the midst of both a cultural and financial upswing. Revenue in the last quarter, reported in early March, was just over $1 billion, a 46% increase from the same period last year. The company expects full-year revenue to increase by 9% year over year. Wrangler specifically has been a standout for the portfolio, with a 10% revenue increase last quarter and double-digit gains in its Western category, which is a focus of its Stagecoach marketing. Wrangler has seen continued growth in its women’s and direct-to-consumer businesses.
Kontoor leadership on the earnings call described a goal of accelerating Wrangler’s growth through increased marketing investments. The larger presence at music festivals like Stagecoach and Austin City Limits is a part of that plan.
“Of course, we have to connect these efforts to things like CRM growth,” Wheeler said. “When we sponsored Lainey’s tour, we hosted a trivia game with prizes, and you had to give your email at the end. And at Stagecoach and Austin City Limits, at our tents, you can scan your festival bracelet, and we can remarket to those people. Growing the consumer database is one of the biggest ROIs from festivals.”
