Gatorade: Connecting Brand and Consumer

The Challenge

One of the best ways to practice empathy is to actually experience it with your target. Gatorade signed up to do just that. They wanted to get out of the office and into their consumer segments’ everyday lives… and to really take a walk “in their shoes.” The challenge was two-fold: understand consumers’ relationship to sports and working out, and get the client teams out of their comfort zones along the way!

The Approach

We designed two seriously action-packed days to make it all happen – kicking it off with an extensive immersion + empathy training, outfitting the Gatorade insights, marketing, and sales teams with all the skills they would need to get out in the field and get to know their consumers as real people.

And when we say ‘field’ we’re not kidding! 102 clients,140 consumers (from ages 6-55) and a handful of professional motivators (fitness instructors, coaches and wellness enthusiasts) took to the soccer fields, racquetball courts, yoga mats, and gym spaces to work it out together, before sitting down to have a relaxed, informal chat about life and the role of sports and activity in their lives––all lead and organized by your fav ‘ head coaches’ at The Sound.

The Impact

The event wrapped up with a half day of workshops, where we guided the Gatorade teams through what they heard. We identified key foundational learnings, breakthrough insights, and business-changing implications for the brand moving forward.