Back in 2022, Smiley celebrated its 50th anniversary with a global campaign that reached billions of people around the world through over 60 brand collaborations, street art activations, pop-up shops and takeovers.
The campaign increased brand awareness by 15%, brand love by 32% and resulted in over $521 million in retail sales.
For 2027 and Smileys 30th anniversary, the company is looking to go ‘bigger and better’, combining digital and physical activations which celebrate the importance of the brand and the phenomenon it started.
Nicolas Loufrani expanded his father’s legacy by adapting the iconic Smiley in 1997, creating different categories of Smileys and revolutionising global communication through digital emoticons, allowing people to express themselves digitally and physically.
Since then, Smileys has grown to include thousands of icons across more than 20 categories, such as emotions, animals, flags, nations occupations, sports and more. Originally sold under the brand SmileyWorld, it has now been joined by Mini Smiley, a preschool brand, and S.W.Smiley, with an edgier art direction for young adults, all using different styles of Smileys.
In 2027, Smileys will be celebrating their 30th anniversary, inviting creators, gamers, innovators, and style leaders to join The Smiley Company to ‘Express Your World’. The anniversary will blend digital activations with physical opportunities allowing everyone to get involved and truly express themselves.
The past and future of the brand will be combined, ensuring it resonates with all key audiences.
Plans include:
- Access to the extensive archive of tens of thousands of icons, characters and style guide graphics, offering endless collectable opportunities and segmentation by age, gender, market tier and lifestyle.
- Major IP collaborations with partners joining the event to create unique content across animation, music and video games.
- Creating retail campaigns with key mass and high street chains and pop-up shops in major local department store chains.
- A major celebration of internet culture, showcasing the brand’s role as the first and digital IP phenomenon, and powered by upcoming digital partnerships with global players.
- 100s of existing partners, suppliers, retailers, brands and promotion agencies, launching consumer products and participating in the marketing campaigns.
- Global advertising and PR agencies implementing and amplifying a global communications campaign across the US, Canada, France, Italy, UK, GAS, Spain, Mexico, Brazil, GCC, India, China, Korea, Japan, Australia and New Zealand.
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