Brooklyn Nets in Paris
The 6th Annual Awards
- Best Global Campaign
- Best Event or Experiential Campaign
ABOUT THIS ENTRY
As part of The NBA Paris Game 2024 presented by Revolut, the Brooklyn Nets basketball team brought the Best of Brooklyn to the streets of the capital. From January 8-13, the Brooklyn Nets created a series of experiences across the City of Lights focused on basketball, music, food, fashion and art including: a Brooklyn Nets-themed pizzeria, tribute concert to one of the world’s greatest rappers, Brooklyn’s own, The Notorious B.I.G., an exclusive collaboration with Brooklyn’s iconic fashion brand, KidSuper, a series of free-to-enter contests, and a City Edition Designed by KAWS uniform experience. These experiences celebrated two cultures—Brooklyn and Paris—both rooted in community and creativity.
How does this represent “Excellence in Engagement”?
The NBA is increasingly focused on expanding their international reach to build fandom and a global community of support. The Brooklyn Nets are one of the few NBA teams with dedicated international marketing and sponsorship personnel whose singular focus is to grow international outreach, build relationships with international brands and strategize new and creative forms of international engagement.
While much of that focus centers on social media content that reaches fans around the world, the Brooklyn Nets capitalized on our opportunity to activate in an international market through truly thoughtful and authentic programming rooted in a culture of creativity. We believe that our Brooklyn in Paris campaign sets the bar for others in the industry to find new and different forms of engagement with markets outside their own.
Experiential and global campaigns are most effective when they combine the interests and passions of both cultures rather than imposing one on another. Our activations and experiences created moments of delight, surprise and joy for all those we touched and we hope inspired other industry leaders to do the same.
Objective
The Brooklyn Nets were thrilled to be selected for the 2024 NBA Paris Games. Upon selection, we wanted to create a special campaign to connect Brooklyn to Paris. Brooklyn is a true melting pot, with more than 150 nationalities represented across the borough and the Nets fanbase is increasingly global. Brooklyn and Paris have in common a love of sports, culture, art, fashion, food and music and we knew that we could create a unique campaign that was authentic to our brand, our fans and the people of Paris.
The Nets have built a dedicated international marketing department focused on growing our fan base abroad in priority markets. We are constantly strategizing around how to interact with global fans whether through creative campaigns or partnering with notable international brands or talent.
According to our research, there are approximately 94M global Nets fans, and we see tremendous upside in engaging with them. A meaningful portion of our individual ticket purchasers this season are international buyers, most of the Nets’ followers on social media are outside the US, and New York is the most visited U.S. city by foreign tourists, all illuminating how important global fan development is to our business.
Strategy & Execution
The concept for Brooklyn in Paris came from our desire to showcase the best of Brooklyn with various activations throughout the week of the NBA Paris Game. We wanted to ensure fans back home and around the world could consume and enjoy our content even if they were not physically in Paris.
Our week-long, Brooklyn-themed pizza pop-up experience at Sonny’s Pizza featured an opening night influencer party, Sabrina Ionescu appearance, NBA and Paris Saint-Germain influencer party, Harry Giles III appearance, Paris Game watch party, “Paris & Basketball” documentary premiere, Tuvok12 content shoot (TikTok and IG), KidSuper appearance, Brooklyn Basketball clinic pizza party and two merch drops that could be purchased exclusively on-site.
At the Théâtre du Châtelet, we hosted a 90-minute orchestral experience inspired by the best of Brooklyn’s “King of Hip-Hop.” The event featured a 40-piece local French orchestra; conductor Miguel Atwood-Ferguson; Biggie producer and DJ Clark Kent; Biggie’s son, CJ Wallace; and Junior M.A.F.I.A. member Lil’ Cease and was attended by all Nets players, executives, ownership, VIPs, and celebrities and influencers. Finally, an immersive pop-up experience at NBA House, the league’s fan fest around the Paris Game, highlighted the KAWS City Edition uniform, replicating the KAWS open video set.
Organizations
- Brooklyn Nets
- BSE Global
Links
Featured
- KidSuper
- Sabrina Ionescu
- The Notorious B.I.G. (Family friends & collaborators)
- KAWS
- Ben Simmons
- Cameron Johnson
- Mikal Bridges
- Dorian Finney-Smith
- Dennis Schroder
- Nic Claxton
- Noah Clowney
- Dariq Whitehead
- Keon Johnson
- Keita Bates-Diop
- Cam Thomas
- Day'Ron Sharpe
- Trendon Watford
- Lonnie Walker
- Dennis Smith Jr
- Jalen Wilson
Credits
Ron Goldenberg
Vice President, International Marketing and Innovation
BSE Global
Doron Tamari
Director, International Marketing and Innovation
BSE Global
Benjamin Katz
Manager, International Marketing and Innovation
BSE Global
Amanda Pong
Senior Director, Merchandising
BSE Global
Maya Williams
Senior Director, Marketing Operation
BSE Global
Andrew Karson
Executive Vice President, Brand Marketing, Strategy and Solutions
BSE Global
Celebrate in NYC
Join us for the 6th Annual Hashtag Sports Awards™ on the evening of June 6, 2024 as we celebrate finalists and reveal the winners of this year's awards live during the show.
