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Trailblazers: A new kind of creative agency at KEMMLER KEMMLER

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Over in Berlin, KEMMLER KEMMLER are breaking down the traditional boundaries between art & design agencies and strategy implementation to deliver high-profile campaigns across the fashion and lifestyle industries. Sebastian Kemmler, one of the agency’s four sibling founders, has big plans for the future as well. Here’s what he had to say to Creativepool.

Hi Sebastian, to kick things off can you tell us abit about KEMMLER KEMMLER?

KEMMLER KEMMLER is something of a traditional family business. It was founded by four siblings who individually made their names in fashion, advertising, architecture and finance. Katharina is the creative director, Sebastian is in charge of strategy, David leads the architecture unit and Kornelius deals with the finances. The agency was founded five years ago and in that time has grown to include more than 20 people covering various disciplines.

We are able to meet the demands of all modern-day fashion and lifestyle clients. From digital campaigns & photoshoots to social media strategy, conventional OOH and ATL channels and physical retail architecture, we do it all under one roof.

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What makes you different to other creative agencies?

KEMMLER KEMMLER is a new kind of creative agency specialising in the world of fashion and lifestyle design. We are a very visually-driven agency, with a focus on creating stunning imagery, videos and installations that pop out in social feeds. Unlike most fashion and design agencies though, we don’t just focus on the arty side of things, we also have a strong strategy unit in house. Sebastian worked as Planning Director at AKQA in London and New York, leading the strategy on ground-breaking projects for Nike, Google and Verizon.

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Tell us about Nike's first ever Snapchat campaign which you guys created. What was the brief and why was Snapchat the right medium to fulfill it within?

Our objective was to establish the Nike Lunar Epic show as THE running shoe amongst a young, fashionable, female crowd in Germany. The best way to do this was through utilising a Snapchat, campaign because it guaranteed a high reach and allowed our audience to gain the most intimate insight into the daily lives of their role models.

We created a campaign around the idea of a digital Snapchat relay. Each day another influencer (such as Caro Daur) dedicated their Snapchat channel to running with the Nike Lunar Epic, posting about what kept them running. At the end of the day they handed the ‘digital baton’ over to the next runner.

In total we achieved over 10 million views on Snapchat, 160.000 likes on Instagram and over 20 million impressions in total – proving that Snapchat is quickly turning into the most relevant channel when it comes to reaching fashionable twenty-somethings!

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What have you guys been most proud of creatively speaking in 2016?

The ground-breaking success of the new Bread&Butter show has made us very proud. We transformed a traditional trade show into the first ever consumer-fashion trend show. KEMMLER KEMMLER was responsible for the strategic concept, architecture and campaign of this innovative new format.

The trend show featured 25 of the coolest fashion brands in the world, including Nike, Adidas, Converse, G-Star, Hugo, Levi’s, Lee, Topshop and Reebok, allowing them to showcase their freshest products and newest ideas for the upcoming season. Additionally, eight brands staged the first ever fashion shows that were open to everyone.

Experiences from the event in Berlin were then streamed across 52 live streams to Facebook, turning B&B into Facebook’s biggest ever LIVE show. The live-stream of the Hugo fashion show reached 3,5 million people alone. In total 20,000 trendsetters attended the event and posted about their experiences. 100 million people were reached purely via user generated content and in total we achieved 527 million media impressions across all 15 markets in Europe.

The B&B showcased the power of blending physical and digital marketing. We created kick-ass experiences in the real world and boosted them through the social channels to millions of people.

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Yeah the show looked pretty epic! Was working on an event in this way something new for you?

Working on this project was totally new for everyone involved, because a fashion trend show open to everyone had never existed before. We had to invent the concept as we went along. This was only possible because we worked with Zalando in an integrated way which meant we could overcome the traditional borders between client and agency. We worked in small, agile teams combining client and agency people in sprints, eventually developing a physical event in the same way that startups usually develop software.

There's a 'back to school' feeling in the air. What would you recommended to people as they head back to their desks?

The one tool that has truly changed the day-to-day workings in our agency is the Facebook Audience Insights Tool. Especially now it has been extended to include Instagram data. Never before has it been so easy to get free access to audience data on an international scale. We use it to size audiences, estimate media budgets, explore our audience interests and identify influencers who we should leverage. It might not be the newest tool, but it’s definitely one of the most relevant. No one is excused for not having data-based insights today.

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What advice would you give to someone just starting out in the industry then, how can they make an impression in these very fast moving technological times?

These are great times for a new generation of creative talents because there is such a transformation happening in the creative industry right now. New digital platforms are revolutionising how content is produced, consumed and distributed, and new, young talents know how to handle the social platforms much better than the older people sitting in the agencies right now. My advice for newbies is to become an expert on a specific platform. Become THE Snapchat, Musical.ly, Tinder, Instagram-master. All agencies need people who understand these platforms inside out. From there you can expand your footprint into the traditional channels.

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What new technology are you loving then?

Everyone is very excited about 360 video, but up unto now there haven’t been any great executions. We’re exploring several ideas to create a 360 video campaign around a creative idea that makes genuine good use of the new technology. What's been your biggest creative challenge this past year? Our biggest creative challenge was to create our own website. It’s incredible how hard it is, utilising all the skills, expertise and ideas you put to good use at your clients each day - on your own communication. Seems absurd, but it’s true.

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What do you want to master in 2017?

In 2017 we want to bring all video and web production in house and turn our agency into a digital-content hub. The traditional barriers between agency, production and media distribution are breaking down in the digital age as all creative tools are available to everyone. Only agencies who turn into genuine publishing factories will survive.

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