Benjamin Moore Creates World’s Largest Wooden Yo-Yo

Sometimes you stumble upon a marketing stunt and you wonder why in the world a marketer or ad agency would go there. Then you look at the sheer creativity of the stunt and you begin to realize marketing isn’t always about giving a person information about a product.

Oh sure, doing stunts just for fun with no connection to a brand really isn’t going to be all that productive, but this stunt created by The Martin Agency for Benjamin Moore accomplishes both quite nicely.

Aiming to tout the benefits of Benjamin Moore Arborcoat stain which revitalizes old wood, the agency created what it’s billing as the world’s largest yo-yo. Using old deck planking, a 6 foot tall, 500 pound yo-yo was created and attached to a 100 foot crane in Southern California’s Sierra Pelona Valley.

A microsite details the engineering behind the two week build of the yo-yo which involved a team of seven craftsmen, an expert from Duncan Yo-Yos, 500 pounds of reclaimed Douglas Fir and three gallons of Benjamin Moore Arborcoat stain. There’s also a tips and trick video for those who just might want to build their own 400 pound yo-yo.

How many gallons of Benjamin Moore Arborcoat will this campaign help sell? That’s unknown at this point, but that’s like asking how many Volvo Trucks were sold after Jean Claude Van Damme did his Canes Lions-winning Epic Split atop two moving trucks. Yes, these stunts will help sell product but it will be due to long haul brand-building which must go hand in hand with more direct sales-focused efforts implemented at the same time.

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