Sprite has long been a top-three sparkling beverage in China, but the brand has consistently lost market share to Genki Forest, an aggressive local competitor with much deeper pockets, in recent years. Genki Forest outspends Sprite 2:1 investing heavily in passion points to appeal to Chinese Gen Z – the category’s biggest source of growth.
The fast-approaching summer season was the sparkling category’s crucial battleground during which Sprite needed to fight back by boosting brand affinity, engagement, and sales.
Our rival was pouring money into the hottest celebrity spokespeople and big-ticket show sponsorships, all tried-and-tested methods to gain top-of-mind awareness and get top billing in stores.
We realized that to step well ahead of the competition, we needed to tear up the typical youth marketing playbook and find a new approach that would deeply connect with young Chinese consumers on their own terms yet in an ‘only Sprite can do’ way.
