The story of
Turning brand development into an Emmy award-nominated creative endeavor.
Grindr wanted to enter the cultural conversation. They came to us with the goal of elevating above run-of-the-mill branded content, creating a project that could stand on its own as premium entertainment while remaining genuine to their user’s tastes and demographics.
Out of our collaboration emerged Bridesman, a hysterical, witty, and Emmy-nominated six-part web series which screened at prestigious film festivals, garnered industry accolades and press, and launched on Grindr’s platforms, generating millions of views in its first week.
How it Started:
The Idea:
When creator John O’Nieal was looking for a home for his 30-minute comedy series, its witty gay humor felt perfect for a brand like Grindr.
As we learned more about Grindr’s goals, we eventually adapted the series into bite-sized six-minute episodes that more organically spoke to the demographics and release plans Grindr had for premium content.
Distribution
A key goal with the series was always to elevate it out of the world of branded content and up to the level of prestige. With that in mind, we treated Bridesman as we would any other scripted project, using our expertise in the narrative world to shepherd the series through the halls of indie film and taking it to territory unreachable for standard branded content.
We worked with our friends at the prestigious queer film festival Outfest to coordinate a dedicated screening to premiere the series. We also played in the Tribeca Film Festival’s branded section and at Frameline Film Festival (where Bridesman had its own night at San Francisco’s historic Castro Theater). Later that year our team participated in The Gotham Week’s episodic lab to explore further distribution options for the series beyond its online release.
Throughout the process we worked with a film-specific PR agency to generate buzz in industry circles, creating posters, trailers, and press materials, while working closely with Grindr’s marketing team to maximize our reach.
Bridesman’s journey culminated in a push for an Emmy, which epitomized the project’s double-pronged marketing approach. Not only did the campaign successfully earn an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Actress in a Short Form Series, it also put Grindr into the cultural conversation. The nomination sparked social buzz for weeks as we worked with our teams to handle PR, outreach and native advertising via Grindr integrations.
Nobody expected grindr to have an emmy nom, but here we are.
While we took the show through its festival run, Grindr’s team was building a new functionality to embed content natively in the app. Starting on April 1st, 2021, one episode of Bridesman was released each day inside the app, where it was pushed to its millions of daily users. In this way, Bridesman spearheaded Grindr’s larger push towards elevating the app into a cultural hub.
To accompany this rollout, our team produced cast photoshoots, custom trailers, and digital assets for social platforms and beyond.
Ultimately, Bridesman served both as a prestigious piece of content in its own right and as branded content that fueled Grindr’s shift from a dating app to a cultural brand. The show’s success throughout its festival run, online release, and Emmy’s campaign allowed it to reach beyond the anticipated audience and positioned Grindr as a formidable powerhouse in the LGBTQ+ culture space.
