by By: Sidney Wu
To strengthen my creative brain muscles, I created a campaign for Hydroflask water bottles. I have been a dedicated Hydroflask customer for almost a decade and love their product. However, like in most markets, there have been many emerging water bottle companies that have been trying to trump Hydroflask’s success. For example, the infamous Stanley Cup water bottles that are a fan favorite for consumers ranging from teenagers to mothers right now.
The campaign I brainstormed for Hydroflask is a campaign in honor of National Hydration Day coming up on June 23rd. The campaign would allow consumers to get a free 12-ounce (kids’ size) water bottle with every purchase of a 32-ounce Hydroflask water bottle. This would encourage more people to not only hydrate themselves but also make sure to hydrate their little loved ones. The limited-time deal could playoff of their slogan, “One Lifetime. Fill Often,” but instead for the campaign’s slogan be, “One Lifetime. Hydrate Everyone Often.”
The campaign picture I imagined for this campaign was a mom in nature with her Hydroflask bottle and a young boy in nature also with his Hydroflask. The target market for Hydroflask consumers is typically active people or “outdoorsmen,” so I wanted to create a realistic campaign picture of the targeted consumer and their child in nature with their Hydroflask.
The most difficult part about using an AI image generator was trying to portray the Hydroflask water bottle correctly. The AI had a hard time recognizing the fact that I was talking about a specific water bottle brand and when they did attempt to put the logo on the water bottle, the logo was very hard to recognize. I also struggled trying to get a picture of a mom and her son with the water bottle. The AI generator kept turning the Hydroflask water bottle into the limbs of the mom or son. I found that the pictures came out better when I told the AI to just focus on creating a picture of one person rather than two. I think that when I told the AI to create two people and the water bottle it overwhelmed the generator.
In the end, I chose these two photos listed above because they were the least scary to look at. It is always fun to get to do a project like this because using AI generators challenges me to think differently than I’ve ever thought before.
Feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn.
Great post! The idea of featuring a mom and her son in a natural setting is a great choice to resonate with Hydroflask’s target market of active individuals and outdoors enthusiasts. It adds a personal touch and helps potential consumers envision themselves using the Hydroflask water bottle in real-life scenarios. I can understand the challenges you faced in using AI image generators to bring your vision to life. Getting the logo recognition and maintaining the integrity of the Hydroflask water bottle can indeed be tricky, but you managed to find suitable photos that convey the essence of the campaign. It’s inspiring to see how AI generators can push us to think differently and explore creative solutions. Your dedication to the project and willingness to adapt to the AI’s limitations are commendable. This campaign has the potential to engage Hydroflask’s existing customers while attracting new ones, especially with the added incentive of a free water bottle for kids. Overall, your blog post highlights the importance of creativity and innovation in marketing campaigns. Keep up the excellent work, and I look forward to reading more about your creative endeavors in the future!
I really enjoyed reading your blog, and I love that you addressed some of the challenges you experienced using an AI image generator. I had similar struggles generating images for my campaign idea. Many of my images including people were missing limbs, or sometimes even heads. I agree that many of them did look pretty scary, and I also think that this was a fun project to experiment with.
As a long-time user of Hydro Flask, I really enjoyed reading your post. I think the campaign you brainstormed is a great idea. I like the concept of honoring National Hydration Day, and gifting consumers a free kid-size water bottle with every purchase of a 32-ounce Hydro Flask. Supporting the hydration of not only paying customers but their little ones as well is important. I also enjoyed reading about your experience with AI. I similarly struggled with generating images for my campaign idea, because of how difficult it is to get a normal-looking face. I agree that using AI generators can be challenging but fun to experiment with.
National Hydration Day is the perfect collaboration for HydroFlask. I like how you used AI to incorporate real images that look realistic and that HydroFlask could really use. I think that AI is going to become really helpful when generating ideas for campaigns and creating content that is intriguing. I liked how you included different ages of people in the photos to show that National Hydration Day can be important to all age groups.
This is a great post. I see the vision behind both of the images you shared, and I think you totally nailed it. I love your honesty at the end of the article- when I was playing around with AI generators for our project earlier this term (for my client, a seafood distributor) I generated some truly horrifying images. While I agree with what we discussed in class about the AI tech not being “quite there” yet, I’m also with you that it’s SUPER fun to challenge myself and try to figure out how to get what I want from the image generators.