HP Turns Movie Lobbies Into Printer Showrooms

Reasoning that consumers had to physically touch its product to get the full experience of it, Hewlett-Packard is rolling out a cinema campaign for its Photosmart Premium with TouchSmart Web printer with in-lobby demos.
 
The printer sports a small touch screen that allows a person to print directly from it without a computer via simple applications from HP's content partners including Fandango, coupons.com, Google Maps, Snapfish, USA Today and DreamWorks.
 
HP launched the printer in September with a TV, print and online campaign from Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco. A TV ad featured animation showing how the printer can be used to print Google Maps directions. Tagline: "Touch the Web, print the Web."

Tariq Hassan, vp of marketing for HP, said that campaign, as extensive as it was, wasn't enough to convey the benefits of the printer.
 
"The one thing we knew was touching was believing," he said. "It's such a different mind-set. It's a new printing distribution channel. We had to create more than awareness; we had to touch the consumer. The theater was a natural fit."
 
HP has used cinema before, but its past efforts are dwarfed by the latest campaign, which broke this month and runs through Dec. 24.
 
The estimated seven-figure in-cinema campaign includes a 30-second spot and HP-themed interstitials running throughout National CineMedia's prefeature program on more than 17,300 theater screens, as well as on Screenvision's theater network.
 
The spot is also running on National CineMedia's Lobby Entertainment Network of 2,600 plasma screens.
 

Continue to next page →