Rugby World Cup Signage and Wayfinding

Initiated in 1987, the Rugby World Cup (RWC) is a quadrennial event that, like its soccer counterpart, assembles national squads of the world’s best players. Its participants comprise top finishers in the last RWC and regional qualifiers. For New Zealand, a sparsely populated nation (approximately the size of Japan, with only four million inhabitants), the logistics of hosting such an event in its largest city, Auckland, provided a challenge. More than 133,000 rugby fanatics converged on “Kiwi” soil from September 9 to October 23 last year.

Naturally, promotion entailed a major event-management component. The Auckland Tourism, Events and Economic Development Council (ATEED), which managed the event, awarded all of the Cup’s marketing activity to Ogilvy’s Auckland office. In addition to TV, print and other, traditional-media promotional outlets, Ogilvy partnered with several suppliers to execute numerous, innovative environmental graphics.

“We wanted to position the city as a thriving event hub, and make Aucklanders proud of their city, while ensuring visitors an experience second to none,” Paul Manning, Ogilvy Auckland’s executive director, said.
A 13,000+-sq.-ft. building wrap served as the project’s most iconic component. Omnigraphics crafted hundreds of 4 x 6-ft. panels of ContraVision® window film to the exterior panes of Auckland’s skyscraping Tower Insurance Building. Ogilvy’s production manager, Jules Calnan, said, “The film’s application method was easier than any other material we tested, which is important when working 50 meters in the air.”

Inset within the ContraVision panels was the RWC’s “The World’s Here to Play” logo, which was produced with 3M™ Controltac® with Comply air-release media. Omnigraphics printed all of the materials on its EFI-VUTEk 3360 UV-cure-ink printer.

Ogilvy devised a “KaBoom Box”, to represent and advertise the fireworks display for the 2011 Rugby World Cup’s opening ceremony. The “KaBoom Box” was built with stacks of 40-ft.-tall shipping containers supported with scaffolding & concrete weights. Juggernaut (Auckland) wrapped the box with billboards printed from PVC media, which totaled more than 1,100 sq. ft. The shop printed the graphics on an HP Scitex XP2100 UV-cure-ink printer.

To boost RWC fan buzz at the street level, Ogilvy designed a “Fan Trail,” which marked an officially designated walkway that led from downtown Auckland to Eden Park, the RWC’s host stadium. Numerous vendors and performers enlivened the district. Panda Visuals (Manukau City, NZ) fabricated the pavement graphics using Avery’s MPI 6121 Street Graphics® media.

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Standing exhibit graphics were constructed with 5mm-thick Corflute™ polypropylene sheet, with graphics applied on Avery Graphics’ MPI 3000 glossy, permanent-adhesive, and laminated with Avery’s DOL 3200 cast media. The panels were secured with aluminum frames and rotating, molded bases. All Fan Trail graphics were printed on an HP Scitex LX800 printer.