Belvoir St Theatre launches new integrated campaign and website via Alphabet Studio, photographer Gary Heery and Picket Studio

Striking black and white portraits, a new mobile-friendly website, a witty launch movie by actors Toby Schmitz and Ewen Leslie, and a full online, social media, print, outdoor and cinema advertising campaign; Belvoir 2013 Season has been launched like a catapult via Alphabet Studio and photographer Gary Heery with website creation via Picket Studio.

The look of the 2013 Season is based on tightly cropped black and white portraits of actors.

WATCH LAUNCH MOVIE

Says Tina Walsberger, Belvoir’s marketing manager: “The monochrome campaign is a great evolution of our brand. After a series of brightly hued campaigns, and the predominance of bright colours in current arts marketing, we agreed with our design company Alphabet that it was worth taking a leap to run with something completely different.”

As well as the 2013 Season book, Alphabet has created print, online, outdoor and cinema advertising for the campaign.

Season launch events usually feature a presentation from the artistic director in a very analogue fashion, Belvoir decided to make a launch movie which could continue to have a life online. The 36-minute movie is a witty and somewhat satirical look at how a season is programed and an introduction to each of the 14 shows in the season. The decision paid has off already with total views approaching 2000 in less than a week.

Working with Picket Studio, Belvoir is the first arts company in Sydney to launch a new website with mobile functionality. Using responsive design, the full website auto-adjusts to smartphones and tablets, catering for the ever-increasing mobile audience, which Walsberger says regularly stands at a quarter of Belvoir’s website users.

Says Walsberger: “It’s early days, but so far the campaign has been very well received. Our average eDM open rates this year sit 350% higher than last year’s and we had a 150% increase in website traffic around the two days of our launch. We were incredibly pleased to have exceeded our theatre subscription target by 14% in 2012 and hope our improved digital strategy and capabilities will help us achieve more great things in 2013.”

Client: Belvoir

Photography: Gary Heery