The Challenge:
With the start of each winter season Whistler Blackcomb faces the challenge of maintaining its leadership position, promoting opening day, raising awareness for (usually awesome) early season conditions, stimulate visitation and generating general stoke and buzz among snow-lovers. For the start of the winter 2011.12 season, Origin was challenged to create a campaign that would

• Increase brand awareness and brand engagement for Whistler Blackcomb
• Entertain, inform and inspire with a story that would incite trial and increase loyalty
• Showcase Whistler Blackcomb’s unique assets and communicate early snow and opening day messaging
• Create and distribute quality, compelling video, text and photo content
• Drive traffic to whistlerblackcomb.com and the Whistler Blackcomb social channels
• Engage both the mainstream skier and the core skier and snowboarder, without alienating either

Within the changing marketing landscape, it was clear that a fresh approach to this challenge was required and the traditional print, tv and radio campaigns wouldn’t make the grade.

The Approach:
Building upon the central insight that while storytelling is enduring as a marketing tool, today’s stories need to be a conversation rather than a lecture. They require a “hole” in the story into which customers can insert themselves and connect with the brand. With this in mind, Origin proposed a “blogger-in-residence” strategy that would provide a unique platform on which Whistler Blackcomb could communicate its key messages in an engaging, genuine and transparent way, without alienating the core ski and snowboard audience who see straight through and dismiss and traditional ’sales’ efforts. The result was “Embedded – Inside the Story”, a collaboration with pro skier and award-winning filmmaker Mike Douglas (and his company Switchback Entertainment) aimed at kicking the season off with a bang. A new media concept with PR and social applications, the campaign embedded Mike at the peak of Whistler Mountain in a Patrol Shack for 6 days and nights with nothing but a sleeping bag and his camera, to create behind the scenes video reports of a mountain preparing for Opening Day.

The Outcomes:
A campaign teaser was concepted by Origin and Switchback Entertainment, with a call to action to sign up for the notification when Mike’s adventure would begin. A campaign web page (whistlerblackcomb.com/embedded), designed by Origin and developed by the Whistler Blackcomb team operated as a central hub where Mike’s posts, a Flickr gallery featuring still photo documentation by ski photographer extraordinaire Paul Morrison, and a live Twitter feed provided even more content from life at the top of the mountain. An online advertising campaign in vertical media drove traffic to the site. And of course the main event —six beautiful, inspiring and entertaining webisodes were created by Switchback Entertainment and loaded nightly to recap the prior day’s events.

While the campaign is still in circulation, the result is a project that truly captured the hearts and minds of mountain lovers and was shared widely through social channels. The campaign has netted over 200,000 video views since the campaign began just days before opening day. Spikes have also been tracked in web traffic, social media engagement, sharing and interaction.

http://embedded.whistlerblackcomb.com/

The City of Trail is getting buzz, not because it’s home to the largest zinc smelter in the world and prices are up, but because of a new ski movie that’s going viral.

JP Auclair’s urban skiing segment was posted 2 weeks ago on several ski mag forums, and the contagion factor was as rapid an Ebola fever pandemic. The fact that the segment has generated more than half a million hits on vimeo was enough to make it prime-time newsworthy, especially given the eagerness of Trail’s mayor to claim it as a local success story. (The story runs at 11:43.)

Our takeaway from this well-deserved success for the hard-working crew and athletes behind All.I.Can?

JP Auclair Street Segment (from All.I.Can.) from Sherpas Cinema on Vimeo.

1. 90 awesome seconds of a ski film will do more for the image of a town than a city-convened Image Committee will achieve in three years.

2. Social success is now driving mainstream media headlines.

3. Dave Mossop’s mustache WON Movember.

But seriously, we’ve seen evidence of this appetite for authentic story, character and playfulness, (as distinct from contrived and highly managed messaging), with several of our winter campaigns, from the Tourism Whistler Sabbatical Project, to Whistler Blackcomb’s Embedded, to Jay Peak’s winter launch of the Pump House.

The campaigns, anchored in digital storytelling and playful experience, have generated massive uptake in consumer engagement, and spilled over into headlines in the New York Times and widespread online sharing. (All we were missing were the mustaches.)

Would you ski a run called DOA? from Tourism Whistler on Vimeo.

Bottom line on how to make prime time headlines? Do good work, that speaks truly to your core constituents. Hit share.

Here’s a gallery featuring some of the top hits, including the weather shock of Mike’s feet leaving Hawaii to crunch across the snow in ski boots, the patrol shack’s resident rodents, the pure stoke of everyone running from the gondola into Opening Day, and the final starry time-lapse.

But, as amazing a job that Mike Douglas and the team at Switchback Entertainment (supported by quite a few superstars behind the scenes at Whistler Blackcomb) did, we venture to say the real star of the show was La Niña. After all, that pounding snow storm that nearly shook the shack down sure delivered paydirt for the opening day, and kicked off this season with pure stoke. The fact that La Niña seems to have embedded herself at Whistler is the best part of all.

One long-time local later told Mike Douglas: “THAT is why I moved to Whistler.” Which tells you that this marketing campaign was no snow-job.

For insight into the campaign, and whether you can expect Embedded II: With a Vengeance, to come soon to a theatre near you, check out this interview with our Creative Director, live on Slopefillers today.

What a fresh way to use their bench of elite athletes. We’re thinking it’s a hit. What about you?

Janalee Budge caught up with Mike Douglas as he packed his gear in preparation of being embedded on the mountain. He was most stoked about his giant torch… although we’re not sure if it made the final packing cut, or not…

Here’s episode two! (PS Happy birthday, Mike!)

EMBEDDED Day 2 of 6 – Control from Whistler Blackcomb on Vimeo.

*Everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while climbing it* – Andy Rooney.

The social-sphere is abuzz today with the launch of #WBEmbedded, a campaign we developed for Whistler Blackcomb to douse winter stoke with jet fuel and light things up! Creative savant Mike Douglas (always willing to take one for the team) has moved out of his cozy little Whistler pad, still sporting a tan from his recent family vacation in Maui, and taken up residence on the top of Whistler Mountain, in the ski patrol shack, to document the onset of winter, where’s he’s logging the experience for us.

Episode 1 is live today. Check it out, and enjoy the buzz. Opening day is Friday and the forecast is for half a metre of snow this week!

EMBEDDED Day 1 – Patience from Whistler Blackcomb on Vimeo.

Mike Douglas, aka “the Godfather,” is the ski industry’s rennaissance man. He just keeps remaking himself. From pro athlete to ski design innovator to event engineer to webisode producer for Salomon Freeski TV, these days Douglas is increasingly inspired to make film–festival quality shorts from his Whistler digital studio, Switchback Entertainment, like the 72 Hour Filmmaker Showdown finalist, Like, or his recent 15 minute short, The Freedom Chair.

LiKE from Switchback Entertainment on Vimeo.

The Freedom Chair – Official Trailer from Switchback Entertainment on Vimeo.

He’s also going deep as part of Whistler Blackcomb’s annual celebration of the season opening, embedding himself on the peak to watch winter arrive.

We chatted with Mike about what’s changing in the world of ski films and what’s fueling his stoke these days.

Why the ski–porn path is diverging in the woods:

This year, Freeskier posted 55 trailers for ski films. There’s definitely been a shift and it started 4-5 years ago. More than anything, what’s responsible is a change in the technology. Good cameras got way cheaper, more accessible and anything to do with video production has gone up in quality. So it’s opened up the world to a lot more people. When it was TGR, MSP, Level 1 and Poor Boyz spitting out ski porn every year, you didn’t get sick of it, because there were only 4 films. When there’s suddenly 20-30, you need to stand out, and you can do that either through technology, which Matchstick has, or through creativity, and that’s been the thing that has changed the game.

Is there a standard path for a filmmaker?

I went about it completely in reverse. I was producing web content and had a solid, consistent product. And 2 years ago, Telluride Film Festival, who had been watching the show, reached out to me and said, ‘have you ever thought about submitting something to the show?’ Uh, no. ‘You should.’ Well, how would I do that? So we played one of the episodes in the film festival and it totally opened my eyes, there’s so much rad stuff to see. I was like, this is so cool, I want to do more.

Are there opportunities for brands to reach the film festival audience?

Without a doubt. Last year, we were more on the festival radar and we screened at ten different festivals. This year, instead of producing 20 episodes for Salomon Freeski TV, we are producing 15 shows, with a view to putting together 3 shows with largest edits for the film festivals. Our goal is to hit fifty festivals this year. I did a little sales pitch to the guys at Salomon and said, we could totally reach the hardcore outdoor demographic through this venue. So I’ve been busting my butt all summer to make short films instead of webisodes, which is harder than I thought it would be. But it’s super inspiring.

1. Half of the 31 million Americans who identified themselves as skiers or snowboarders DID NOT participate in the sport in 09/10, because of increased work and family commitments and not having anyone to go with… And though skier visits were up in Canada, actual participation amongst Canada’s 3.7 million skiers and boarders also continued a ten year decline.
2. US skiers either live near a hill/in a mountainous snowy climate OR earn over $100,000. In Canada, where everyone lives in a snowy climate, the bulk of the snowsports participants live in Vancouver or Montreal and have a household income above $75,000.
3. Snowboarders are more dedicated than skiers in terms of time on snow, but that might also be because they’re predominantly young dudes. (Two thirds of American snowboarders are male, aged 13 – 34 years old.)
4. The most dedicated cohorts in the US? 35-44 year old skiers, and 13-17 year old riders.
5. Skiing grew back when it was sexy. That happened to be during the Sexual Revolution. That’s not the Zeitgeist anymore. We’re now in the Information Age, a wired tribal social time. Snowboarding has nailed this vibe. Skiing needs to tap it.
6. Universities are great breeding grounds for future skiers and riders.
7. So are bowling alleys. (We’re still puzzling over this connection. A fetish for weird skanky stinky footwear?)
8. Girls ski and ride. Women slip away.

The data calls out a difference between ski visits (up) and participation (down.) What the data doesn’t highlight, but isn’t news to any of us: a demographic shift is coming at our industry like a category 6 cyclone. The boomers, those aging sexual revolutionaries, who helped build the industry, are slip–sliding away from the sport.

Attracting new, young participants and converting them into loyal skiers and riders is the call to action for us all.

Follow our 4 part blog series through November for thoughts on growing the sport. (Subscribe to the RSS feed or follow us on facebook or twitter, to learn when the post is live.)

1. La moitié des 31 millions d’Américains se décrivant comme skieur ou surfeur N’A PAS pratiqué ces sports en 2009/10 à cause d’engagement professionnels ou familiaux ou parce qu’ils n’avaient personne pour les accompagner… Même si le nombre de visiteurs venus skier au Canada a augmenté, la participation réelle des 3,7 millions de skieurs et surfeurs canadiens a poursuivi son déclin des dix dernières années.
2. Les skieurs américains vivent à proximité d’une montagne/sous un climat enneigé de montagne OU gagnent plus de 100 000 $. Au Canada, où tout le monde vit sous un climat nordique, la grande majorité des participants aux sports d’hiver vivent à Vancouver ou à Montréal et ont un revenu familial de plus de 75 000 $.
3. Les surfeurs sont plus souvent sur les pistes que les skieurs, la raison pouvant être qu’ils sont majoritairement de jeunes hommes. (Les deux tiers des surfeurs américains sont des garçons et hommes âgés entre 13 et 34 ans.)
4. Les groupes d’âge les plus assidus aux É.-U. ? Les skieurs de 35-44 ans et les surfeurs de 13-17 ans.
5. Le ski est revenu à la mode quand c’était sexy. C’est pendant la Révolution sexuelle. Ce n’est plus l’air du temps aujourd’hui. On vit dans l’ère de l’information, une époque de tribus sociales sur Internet. Le snowboard a bien compris la vibe. Le ski doit le faire.
6. Les universités sont un terrain fertile pour les futurs skieurs et surfeurs.
7. Tout comme les salons de quilles. (On ne la comprend toujours pas celle-là. Peut-être une forme de fétichisme pour les chaussures moches et puantes ?)
8. Les filles skient et surfent. Les femmes s’éloignent.

Les données indiquent une dichotomie entre le nombre de visites de ski (en progression) et la participation (en diminution). Ce que les données ne montrent pas mais que nous savons déjà : une secousse démographique va frapper l’industrie de plein fouet comme un ouragan de catégorie 6. Les boomers, ces révolutionnaires sexuels vieillissants qui ont aidé à bâtir l’industrie du ski, se détachent tranquillement du sport.

Le mot d’ordre de tous : attirer une nouvelle clientèle de jeunes et les convertir en skieurs et surfeurs fidèles.

Suivez la série en 4 parties sur notre blogue durant le mois d’novembre pour des idées sur comment favoriser la croissance du sport. (Abonnez-vous à notre fil RSS ou suivez-nous sur Facebook ou Twitter, pour savoir quand le billet sera en direct.)

For pro skier Chris Rubens, skiing Chile’s Puyehue volcano and Canada’s Freshfield Icefield with the Sherpas for All.I.Can were two of the most amazing trips of his life. He doesn’t argue that there’s an irony of shooting an environmental movie using helicopters. “At the same time, in this day and age, it takes a great deal of flash and excitement to grab our attention. If you make a lower budget movie that impacts fewer people, you are being less efficient and therefore more wasteful. I look at it less as one big number and more on a scale of energy–used versus impact/worthiness.”

Pro skier Eric Hjorleifson shared those same trips with Rubens and the Sherpas. He agrees that the expectations of an action sports audience demand certain shots: “The reality is that to create a high caliber film you have to use cutting edge filming equipment/methods. Helicopter–mounted Cineflex camera shots have become the cutting edge standard to today’s film industry.”

Ultimately, for Hjorliefson, it’s a question of balance. “The Sherpas are working hard to create a progressive film with an environmentally conscious message. One of their goals is to express skiers’ appreciation for the mountains. Skiers’ connection with mountains is what gives us our environmental awareness. My appreciation and passion for the mountains have shaped my life in a very positive way. I think this gives validity and strength to the project’s environmental message. Appreciation for nature is an excellent message to convey.”

Arthur De Jong, Whistler Blackcomb’s Mountain Planning and Environmental Resource Manager, asks: “Would the world or Whistler or the ski industry be better off without this film? I doubt it. It’s got something important to say. Truth isn’t always black and white. People might point out inconsistencies in their film, but if it’s genuine, if the creators are really trying and the audience senses that they are really trying to evoke and be catalysts for change, the support is there. It starts with honesty. That’s the most fundamental aspect to humanity. If we tell the truth, even if it’s not what we’d like to have said, then people have a tendency to roll up their sleeves.”

There might be elements in the film that contradict some of the key messages… just as there are elements in the ski industry that contradict its environmental attributes. De Jong admits,  “I’m not sure if I could defend the ski industry business on environmental grounds. But I could on social grounds. There is a whole spectrum of sustainability. And there are so many social attributes to what we do.”

So, do the ends justify the means? What do you think?

Pour le skieur professionnel Chris Rubens, la descente du volcan Puyehue au Chili et celle du glacier Freshfield Icefield au Canada avec l’équipe de Sherpas dans All.I.Can ont été les deux plus incroyables excursions de sa vie. Il concède qu’il peut paraître ironique de tourner un film environnemental en hélicoptère. « Il faut comprendre qu’à notre époque, il faut créer des images d’impact pour générer de l’attention. Si vous tournez un film à plus petit budget qui touche moins de monde, vous êtes moins efficace et donc vos efforts sont un peu gaspillés. Pour moi, c’est moins l’affaire d’un gros chiffre qu’un rapport entre l’énergie dépensée et l’impact généré. »

Le skieur professionnel Eric Hjorleifson a participé aux mêmes voyages que Rubens et les Sherpas. Il est d’accord que l’auditoire des films de sports d’action réclame certains plans : « La réalité, c’est que pour créer un film de haut calibre, il faut utiliser des méthodes et de l’équipement sophistiqués. Les plans de caméra Cineflex montée sur hélico sont la norme dans l’industrie du film aujourd’hui. »

En bout de ligne, pour Hjorliefson, il s’agit de trouver un équilibre. « Les Sherpas travaillent fort à créer un film progressiste avec un message pro-environnement. Un de leurs objectifs est de montrer à quel point les skieurs apprécient la montagne. C’est cet amour qui éveille la conscience environnementale. Ma passion des montagnes a défini ma vie d’une façon très positive. Je pense que cela crédibilise et donne des arguments au message environnemental du projet. L’appréciation de la nature est un très bon message à véhiculer. »

Arthur De Jong, gestionnaire de la planification en montagne et de la ressource environnementale de Whistler Blackcomb, demande : « Est-ce que le monde, Whistler ou l’industrie du ski seraient en meilleure position sans le film ? J’en doute. Le film véhicule un message important. La vérité n’est jamais tranchée.  Ce n’est pas blanc ou noir. Les gens vont peut-être souligner les contradiction du film, mais si les intentions sont bonnes, si les créateurs font des efforts authentiques et essaient d’être des catalyseurs de changement, et que les spectateurs sont touchés par ce qui est transmis, le film va obtenir du succès. Le point de départ, c’est l’honnêteté. C’est le fondement de l’humanité. Si on dit la vérité, même si ce n’est pas celle qu’on veut entendre, alors les gens ont tendance à se retrousser les manches. »

On peut retrouver dans le film des éléments qui sont en contradiction avec certains messages clé… comme on peut retrouver dans l’industrie du ski des facettes qui contredisent sa vocation environnementale. De Jong l’admet : « Je ne suis pas sûr de pouvoir défendre l’industrie du ski d’un point de vue environnemental. Mais, je peux le faire d’un point de vue social. Le développement durable est quelque chose de très large et nous travaillons à plusieurs niveaux sociaux. »

Alors, la fin justifie-t-elle les moyens ? Qu’en pensez-vous ?

With the world premiere of Sherpas Cinema’s feature film, All.I.Can, just around the corner, we’ve been inspired by pro skier JP Auclair’s call to action: It’s not about doing less. It’s about doing more.

“People that spend a lot of time in the mountains and people that spend a lot of time outside are basically on the frontlines of it all.  We can see it happen firsthand. We feel like we need to be doing less of this, less of that, but I don’t think it’s about doing less. I think it’s about doing more.”

For Auclair, confronting the environmental situation starts with a mental shift away from the negative spin and guilt-tripping that paralyses us into despair and inaction, towards a more progressive exploration of what we should be doing more of. “People feel really bad for living. The whole reduce, reuse, recycle, do less, approach is really counter-creative. It’s not about changing. Reducing is just about making things less. With that mentality, you can never achieve the goal of doing good or being good.  As far as basic philosophy, I think we have to look elsewhere than feeling bad and doing less. It would be cool to explore a philosophy, oriented instead of on doing less, around exploring what we could do more of. ”

While the Sherpas’ All.I.Can film is explores the subject for ski industry and ski film aficionados, other athletes and snow lovers are doing all they can to take the message to a different cohort of influencers and powerbrokers. Aspen’s Auden Schendler, who features in All.I.Can, is fresh from lobbying on Capitol Hill in Washington DC with Gretchen Bleiler, Jeremy Jones and Chris Davenport through Protect Our Winters, a nonprofit dedicated to mobilizing and engaging the snowsports community on climate change. On September 14, they hosted an evening event and then lobbied Congress the next day, as All.I.Can was screening at IF3.

“Historically, most ski films have been what’s know as ’ski porn,’” says Schendler. “But that sells skiers and audiences short. There has always been more to any sport, but especially snowsports. Participants are more than just ski or snowboard fanatics. They’re in it for the lifestyle and the surroundings, and that brings in a level of thought, ethics, and stewardship that’s unique.

I would like to believe that All.I.Can could be a real catalyst within the snowsports world  - but also beyond it.

“We’ve never been able to predict exactly what will be the fulcrum on which society pivots.  I think the relatively small, but incredibly high profile, interesting, fun, energized, newsworthy snowsports world can play a role in the kind of revolution we need on climate. All.I.Can could be a big piece of this change, in part by starting a conversation about our motives, our hopes and aspirations within a small but potent community.

“When modern humans evolved from Neanderthals, they started doing some weird things. Crazy things. Like sailing out into the open ocean, hoping to find something. You have to ask, what were they thinking? What were they looking for? All.I.Can is, I think, asking the same question at the highest level of the sport. Why, actually, are you out there doing this stuff? And what are the consequences of your answer, in terms of how you live you life?”

And that’s our thought for the day. Happy International Day of Peace.