Maynards Bassetts has extended its long-running “Set The Juice Loose” brand platform into the live arena with a new summer campaign built around an on-the-ground activation in Blackpool and supporting digital content. Delivered in partnership with IX, the in-house experiential agency of media group Immediate, the initiative was designed to connect the confectionery brand with leisure audiences in a high-footfall coastal destination at the height of the summer season.
Branded as “The Juiciest Summer”, the campaign combined a physical experience with social-first video assets to increase visibility beyond the immediate event footprint. The activity was fronted by John McDonald, widely recognised as the voice of professional darts, bringing an added layer of sports entertainment familiarity to the engagement.
Background and industry context
Consumer brands are increasingly turning to hybrid experiential formats that merge live event moments with content engineered for digital channels. For confectionery and FMCG marketers in particular, sampling and playful, sensory-led activations remain a core tactic to reinforce brand identity and prompt trial in leisure and tourism environments.
Blackpool, as a major UK resort town with a strong summer visitor profile, continues to be a focal point for this type of seasonal brand presence. By situating activations alongside established local attractions and events, brands can tap into existing flows of families, day-trippers and short-break visitors while generating social content that extends reach beyond location and date constraints.
Agencies such as IX, embedded within broader media organisations, are also positioning experiential work as part of a multi-channel content strategy rather than as a standalone field marketing exercise. This reflects a wider industry shift where live brand experiences are captured, edited and repurposed for social platforms, allowing a single activation to serve both experiential and content-marketing goals.
Key developments in the Blackpool activation
The “Juiciest Summer” execution saw Maynards Bassetts and IX take the “Set The Juice Loose” narrative out of more traditional retail and in-home contexts and into a busy seaside environment. While specific on-site mechanics have not been fully disclosed, the initiative was framed as a live activation, indicating an emphasis on face-to-face engagement, participation elements and product interaction.
McDonald’s involvement as the front-facing personality for the activity was intended to add a recognisable voice and character, drawing on his reputation from the darts circuit. His role formed part of the social-first video content produced around the activation, with footage and clips created for distribution across the brand’s digital and social channels.
Positioning the activity as both a live experience and a content-generation opportunity allowed the campaign team to address two objectives: driving immediate engagement with visitors present in Blackpool and building a bank of assets to sustain the “Juiciest Summer” messaging throughout the wider season.
The project also underlines the use of in-house experiential capabilities by media organisations, with IX operating as Immediate’s internal live-brand team. This structure supports closer alignment between campaign development, media planning and content creation, enabling activations to be produced alongside editorial and commercial content across multiple platforms.
Industry impact for experiential and live campaigns
For the experiential marketing and event technology sectors, the campaign highlights several ongoing trends in how consumer brands approach live activations. First, there is a continued emphasis on building campaigns that are inherently content-ready, where every element of an on-site experience is planned with filming, short-form video and shareability in mind.
Second, the integration of recognisable talent, such as a sports announcer, demonstrates how live experiences are borrowing from broadcast and entertainment playbooks to create a more defined narrative and tone around activations. This approach aligns with the growing convergence between events, sports presentation and branded content.
Third, the choice of a single high-profile location, coupled with social amplification, illustrates an alternative to multi-city roadshows. By concentrating resources in one destination and designing the experience for digital scaling, brands can potentially reduce logistical complexity while still achieving substantial reach.
For agencies and technology providers, this reinforces demand for solutions that streamline capture, editing and distribution of live event content, including mobile production workflows, rapid approvals and formats optimised for social channels.
Why this matters for event professionals and technology providers
Event producers and experiential specialists working with consumer brands can draw several practical considerations from the “Juiciest Summer” model:
- Designing activations as content studios: Live environments are increasingly expected to function as pop-up production spaces. Layout, lighting, sound and audience flow are being planned not only for attendee experience but also for video capture and post-event edits.
- Leveraging personality-led formats: The use of a familiar announcer figure demonstrates how a clear host or MC role can provide structure for both on-site interaction and content scripts, reducing the friction between what works live and what works on camera.
- Data-lite, high-footfall strategies: Activations in open public spaces like seafronts and promenades often prioritise reach, impressions and qualitative engagement over more granular attendee data. Technology providers can respond with tools suited to fast-paced, casual interactions rather than fully registered attendee journeys.
- Single-location impact campaigns: The focus on one major resort underscores a tactical choice: create one highly visible anchor event and use technology to scale the story, instead of replicating smaller activations across multiple locations.
- Alignment with media ecosystems: In-house experiential units within media organisations show how live campaigns can be integrated with publishing, advertising and social distribution. External event partners and platforms may need to adapt by offering APIs, content pipelines or formats that slot easily into such ecosystems.
For hybrid and virtual event technology providers, the case also signals ongoing appetite for bridging on-site and online touchpoints. While this specific campaign focused on physical presence and social video, similar strategies can be extended with livestreams, interactive polls, digital competitions or extended reality elements, where appropriate to the brand and audience.
Conclusion
By bringing its “Set The Juice Loose” platform into a live, destination-based experience, Maynards Bassetts has demonstrated how established consumer brands are evolving seasonal marketing into content-rich activations. The Blackpool “Juiciest Summer” campaign, delivered with IX and fronted by John McDonald, reflects a broader movement towards blending in-person engagement, talent-led presentation and social-first production.
For event and experiential professionals, the initiative reinforces the importance of building campaigns that operate simultaneously as live experiences and media assets. As brands seek to maximise the value of each activation, demand is set to grow for event technologies and workflows that can support this dual role, from capture and editing to measurement and amplification.