Bamsefabrikken - Attracting customers with a mascot for the children

Bilka takes charge of the Sundays
Denmark's largest department and grocery store has taken a major step towards owning the market with mascot wolf Billie. The mascot has been produced in collaboration with advertising agency Recommended and Bamsefabrikken has been responsible for production of the 17 mascot costumes distributed in the grocery stores across the country.

To attract customers to the store is not an easy task today - it is not enough to offer good bargains and distribute a great newspaper. You should also offer a special experience, and this experience should be aimed at the children.

Families with children constitute a huge part of the Bilka audience, and you can give the family a good shopping experience by offering free food, goodie bags and entertainment for the kids. A happy family is likely to add more products to their carts. Moreover, happy customers tend to come back and that is a fact not to be missed.

Therefore 17 Bilka employees each Sunday and on selected occations wear the mascot costume and hand out goodie bags, merchandise and free food to all children. And the result of this marketing exceeds all expectations.

Production of Billie the Wolf mascot costumes
Bamsefabrikken received an initial drawing as depicted to the right of the mascot Billie the Wolf, who is also produced as a small stuffed toy. Based on the sketches, our creative workshop molded a head for Billie, and then costume, clothes, shoes, gloves and a sweatshirt. Bilka and Recommended closely followed the process and approved along the way based on the photos provided by Bamsefabrikken. That way we ensured that the final result was exactly as expected.

Costumes for the mascot Billie in this case were produced in record time - only 22 days elapsed from incoming order to the final mascot costumes were delivered in the department stores.

All Bamsefabrikken's mascot costumes are equipped with an integrated electronic ventilation system in the mascot head that provides cooling air for the person appearing in the costume. A feature, on which we receive only positive feedback, particularly since the mascot Billie appears exclusively indoor in the department stores, where the temperature can be high.

The success of Billie the Wolf has the potential to continue for still a long time, and Bilka has every opportunity to develop the mascot concept and add new ideas.