Propac: Executing Activations with Excellence
Propac is a Plano, Texas-based agency that specialises in brand activation initiatives for clients such as PepsiCo and Frito-Lay North America. The agency and its team are experts in crafting campaigns with activations, such as big stunts and intimate events, at their core, but backed up with integrated thinking.
Propac prides itself on being able to execute its own ideas, something it believes ensures its projects “get into the market faster than our competition”. The agency’s depth of capabilities in this area are vast: it is only a few equipped with an on-site warehouse and distribution centre, allowing them to offer such services as printing, kitting, and fulfilment, all to the ease and benefit of clients.
“We blend buyer insights with retailer knowledge to engage consumers at every activation channel, from digital and social to events and in stores,” a Propac representative tells us. “Our deft understanding of brand activation, brand engagement, and shopper marketing have propelled brands and driven impact for more than 30 years.”
To find out more, Charles Daigle, president, and CEO of Propac.
Q> If we were to contact your client references, what do you think they’ll tell us about you?
Charles> Our partners tell us that Propac Agency is efficient, responsive, and easy to work with. Partners can always count on us to deliver the right solutions, no matter the timeline. We are creative and resourceful, and our team members exceed their highest expectations.
We aren’t afraid to take risks and are confident that even if a client is trying to deliver or create something novel, we have the right experts and solutions to execute with excellence.
Q> Detail your agency’s unique offerings.
Charles> In late 2022, consumers were starved for authentic personal connections, and we saw a lot of pent-up demand for events from brands, retailers, and event facilities like stadiums, universities, hotels, and event centres. Brands have a new responsibility in this age of sustainability, inclusion, and advocacy—and they’re stepping up to the plate.
Propac is very bullish on the short- and long-term future of the space, and we’re currently investing in resources. These include new technologies that unlock the value of event data, personalise experiences for attendees and assets (new vehicles, large-format printers, games and toys, sampling coolers and carts, and drones), and differentiate our clients from other brands and private labels. We’re locking in qualified and experienced event teams (full-time event managers, BAs, drivers).
We create events and experiences that are hybrid live and virtual events. This allows for multiple touch points and creates excitement in the ramp-up and a safety net for last-minute cancellations.
But we’re also expecting continued turbulence in the space including staffing shortages that impact the quality of local event teams, supply-chain challenges that affect production timing, ongoing covid concerns, and health rules and regulations that differ by state. Sky-high gas prices also make mobile tours a challenge: they can lead to the cancellation of summer vacations and reduce event turnout.
Fortunately, none of these challenges are insurmountable for strong brands and vendors that are making every dollar count with lots of pre-planning and a dependable network of decision-makers as partners.
Q> What were some of the highlights for your agency over the last 12 months?
Charles> We’ve made a stronger commitment to be more active in the advertising and marketing community and to serve as industry leaders.
Group creative director Kelly Welch Farquhar judged the 2023 Effie Awards (Commerce & Shopper category). This was her third time judging, but the first time attending in person with representatives from agencies across the country.
Q> Any recent accolades or awards we should be aware of?
Charles> We’ve been busy earning accolades for our agency and the clients we serve. Recent headlines Propac has grabbed include:
- Chief Marketer 200 2022: Propac got kudos for the creativity, quality, value, and communication of its retail brand activations.
- Dallas ADDY Awards: Our talented team scored three ADDYs at this year’s AAF Dallas award show winning 1 Gold (Guerilla Marketing for LifeWTR) and 2 Silvers (logo and OOH installation).
- Ex Awards: Won Silver for Best Omnichannel Event Campaign, and Gold for 7-eleven Delivery Live! for Best Buzz Marketing/Influencer Program
Q> Give us a taste of the culture at your agency.
Charles> Propac is committed to creating and fostering a people-first culture. We celebrate the talents of team members and invite them to bring their unique passions, strengths, and interests to the workplace. We support several employee-created and -led team-building programmes.
By upholding our core values - we will win together through change, dependability, resourcefulness, and community - Propac has built a richer culture where staffers are able to thrive in these challenging times by embracing it, understanding it, and adapting as things evolve. By becoming more dependable in everything we do. It drives our relationships and how we approach projects. Our partners rely on us just as we rely on each other to deliver excellence at every turn. Becoming more and more resourceful.
Everyday we are tasked to approach projects in new and creative ways by tackling and solving challenges with immediate action. Lastly, community is where our heart is. We stand by each other, offer unwavering support, and celebrate together.
Each summer, we hire six to nine ambitious undergrads ready to make waves in the advertising industry, and gain real world experience driving impact for some of the biggest brands. These interns join ‘the Pac’ for an either-week, paid summer intern programme. This year, we raised the stakes with a $1000 scholarship going to the biggest ‘game changer’.
Q> Please tell us about two campaigns from the past 12 months that you’re particularly proud of.
Charles> Kroger Wellness Fest ‘PepsiCo Maze’. At Kroger’s Wellness Festival in Cincinnati, presenting sponsor PepsiCo hosted a fun, interactive space full of Instagrammable vignettes to showcase its portfolio of Better For You products. Our challenge was finding ways to connect joy to PepsiCo brands, highlighting each product’s wellness attributes, and showing how they can contribute to one’s physical and mental health. Even brands not usually considered in the category—such as Pepsi—were on the marquee.
Born from PepsiCo’s mission to ‘create more smiles with every sip and every bite’, our interactive ‘Crunch. Sip. Smile.’ maze gave visitors a chance to explore eight brands and discover surprises behind every corner in a veritable wellness playground. Whether it was finding balance on bare’s baked snacks’ apple slice seesaw, hopping out of bed for a Quaker-fueled morning, or creating smiles on the bubbly sparkling water balloon wall, fans experienced their favourite brands like never before and learned how each product can contribute to their mental and physical health. By bringing them to life, we were able to seamlessly weave them together into a cohesive, fun-filled experience.
To inspire even more participation, we asked fans to snap pics of ‘Instagrammable moments’ throughout the maze and tag with #ShareASmileWithPepsico. Those who did were entered into a sweepstakes for an all-expenses-paid wellness retreat at Omni Grove Park Inn in Asheville, North Carolina.
The maze shared around 150,000 samples with visitors over the two-day event. Plus, brand fans shared hundreds of photos of the larger-than-life installations on Instagram.
Second is Mayfield ‘Summer Tour’. Summer is when memorable moments are made, and it’s just not summer without ice cream. Where people gather for summer fun, there’s an opportunity for a cherished local ice cream brand to be on the move while staying in everyone’s hearts.
In 2022, Mayfield set out to play a central role with its sweet treats by driving local engagement in three key markets—Atlanta, Knoxville, Tennessee, and Charlotte, North Carolina—to increase the connection to the brand, generate buzz in key and competitive markets, and promote its new Simply Crafted bars.
We took this show on the road to make sure Mayfield was always at the centre of the action with a can’t-miss mobile tour and sampling events, then heated up in the summer even more with a 360 integrated campaign that consisted of an MLB sponsorship of the Atlanta Braves, local and radio remotes at events and retailers with iHeartMedia, a digital campaign with Ibotta, and a custom mobile truck for local events.
Our mobile tour stopped at over 24 locations and set up a sampling bar to try Mayfield’s new Simply Crafted bars and win free branded swag such as t-shirts, ice cream scoopers, temporary tattoos, and Mayfield’s one of a kind Maggie Doll.
