For plenty of kids, a bowl of their favourite cereal in the morning is exciting enough. But what happens when they get a boldly printed box—and a box of chocolate and strawberry flavoured cereal as only one of its treasures? What if this Envirokidz Turtle Splash ™ starter kit was also packed with a handmade Glass Sipper glass straw, a Defenders of Wildlife sea turtle plushie, and a Turtle Splash™ adoption certificate, courtesy of conservation group See Turtles? What would the reaction be then?
Alexandra Lam, an Experiential Strategist with Nature’s Path and its child-focused specialty brand EnviroKidz, watched plenty of unboxing reaction videos posted to Instagram as a result of this marketing program, and she can tell us mostly it was: “squealing with excitement.”
According to Alexandra, whose job title doesn’t contain “experiential” for no reason, the Envirokidz Turtle Splash ™ is a product with an unusually satisfying story arc.
It started with an online EnviroKidz poll asking their customers, who are mostly children, which endangered animal should be the focus of an upcoming cereal. After over 70,000 votes were cast, the sea turtle emerged as the winner.
But, how was Nature’s Path team going to create a product “connecting kids with the wonders of nature”, supporting sustainability, and celebrating this iconic animal?
Lam explains that it all came together when EnviroKidz found the right partners to help kids understand the realities of sea turtle endangerment while also connecting with solutions. A handmade, reusable Glass Sipper straw featuring a beautiful baby sea turtle and a Defenders of Wildlife stuffed turtle toy both drive home the importance of reducing marine plastic. Plastic straws, among other single-use plastics, of course, are “public enemy number #1 for turtles”, who often mistake them for food, and the plushie is made from recycled marine plastic.
“It’s so important when we create a product for kids that we not only call out the problem, but also show solutions,” says Lam. “We want these children to grow up empowered and able to make a difference.”
Arguably, the starter kit’s most exciting feature is the certificate that allows kids to symbolically adopt a turtle. With this certificate along with a unique adoption code inside every box of Turtle Splash™, provided by See Turtles, children can visit EnviroKidz’s website and name their own sea turtle. Lam shares that almost 10,000 sea turtle adoptions have been registered so far.
Great Little Box Company (GLBC)/Ideon Packaging had the honour of helping design and digitally print this Turtle Splash™ launch kit. The challenge of helping package what Lam calls “an extremely complex product mix” was a particularly fun one.
With complex, visually-driven digital print work meant to engage and educate consumers, deciding what messages to include and what to exclude is all-important. As Lam says, “A lot of information is already on a cereal box, so how could we focus the box on the plight of sea turtles and easy steps kids can take to protect them?”
Since the products inside the box do most of the educational heavy-lifting, the text could afford to be minimal. The outside of the box is simple, bold, and exciting, printed in red tones. The inside flap has only the essential information arrayed beneath a striking illustration of a sea turtle. Below, the products are arranged in order to both ship safely and create maximum delight.
Lam gives one example: “The insert for the turtle plushie is designed to showcase the toy as adorably as possible by allowing its head to poke out of the cardboard as if it’s newly hatched.” Those details helped create the reactions that “gave [her] team so much gratification” once the product was launched. They knew that with Envirokidz Turtle Splash ™, they had managed to delightfully tell the story of sea turtles while supporting real-world conservation efforts.
When education and engagement is the goal, complex digital print work is nearly always involved. We love the challenge of story-telling and the clients who tackle it with us. And we can think of a few story-tellers as gifted as Nature’s Path and EnviroKidz. Pick up a box of Turtle Splash™ Cereal today!