One Globe One Skate/Germany The genius of the One Globe One Skate campaign for K2 was that the company ran the program outside of its native Germany – where just about every kind of promotional offer is verboten – and then reaped the benefits inside the country. And K2 created the program without agency assistance.
When K2 introduced soft boot inline skates a few years ago, competitors attacked the K2 concept, claiming that soft boots didn’t fit well and were not as durable as hard-shell boots. At the time, Rollerblade commanded about 50 percent of the market share in North America and Europe. Meanwhile, Germany alone comprised 50 percent of the volume. Along with Roces, K2 held only a 15 share in Europe, and it yearned to grab a bigger piece of domestic sales.
K2 set out to demonstrate the comfort, fit, and durability of soft boots to the 12-to-39-year-old target audience. Unfortunately, the company had a limited communications budget, which meant that the promotion needed to be interesting enough to attract significant media attention. Understanding that its target audience wouldn’t appreciate a hard sell job, K2 found a way to get them interested: Enlist five skaters from five continents to participate in a 120-day live product demo that would take them around the world on one pair of soft-boot skates each. In a major coup, K2 got MTV to agree to have a camera crew chronicle the skaters’ journey. Six 30-minute MTV specials resulted, and the footage was ultimately used as an in-store traffic-builder all over the world.
K2 obtained permission for its crew to skate on public European streets – no mean feat – by responding to an invitiation from the European Commission for project proposals promoting its European Year Against Racism cause. K2 won approval when it got official support from South African premier Nelson Mandela, whose Children’s Fund would benefit from donations the skaters collected during their 17-country trek.
K2’s 10,000-kilometer end around German regulation not only proved the durability of the soft boot, but directly reached more than a million people. MTV ran more than 750 minutes of the tour on-air, and K2 skates now feature hang tags with Around the World warranties.
Almost 50 percent of all skates sold in Germany today are soft boots, and K2 has gained market leadership in its homeland with a 40 share.
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