Coachella Festival: the Perfect Marketing Platform for Fashion Labels?

Nowadays, the only thing more important than purchasing the ticket to Coachella, is what your wearing to Coachella. We have all seen enough of those plastic floral crowns around, haven’t we? (No offense, Lana). It is a place where super-sheer-almost-transparent crop tops and short demin cut-offs are not only accepted, but encouraged. Despite all evidence to the contrary, they actually go well together.

In the US, 33 million people attend music festivals every year. This event now attracts a much wider audience, so-called ‘festival watchers’, which means that they don’t physically participate. However, they tune in on social media and pay attention to what’s happening at the festival. A lot of people are interested in the influencers, famous Instagram personalities: the clothes they’re wearing, what kind of style they’re going for – you get the picture.

Fashion labels wouldn’t want to miss the chance to brand themselves on this perfect platform and at this very right time.

Calvin Klein is hosting about 25 digital influencers at a hotel in Palm Springs as part of a three-day ‘branded experience’ to coincide with Coachella. Brands choose influencers that resonate with their brand identity and aesthetic, usually involving social media. “By partnering with a specific brand ambassador, you can have a better lead on exactly how sucessful it will be and how many people it will reach,” says CA creative’s Han. This kind of explains why my Instagram, facebook, and Snapchat were flooded with the feed of the festival last weekend.

“The new generation spend half of their time sharing. If a brand’s festival experience doesn’t integrate social media, these people will miss something,” says the creative director of Hunter, Alasdhair Willis. With that in mind, the Tag Heuer tent will house a photo booth, where guests can take pictures to immediately upload to social media.

Brands such as H&M have launched festival-themed collections. Of course, the festive ‘look’ of flower crowns and flowing dresses, has become its own category within fashion and beauty, creating the experience around the moment where you’re purchasing items for a specific event, or vacation. It really shouldn’t be new for a brand to do this, when you go on to ‘ASOS’ the online retailer, it appears there are so many themed categories: ‘Back to School’, ‘Tropical Vacation’.

“Festivals are more than just a destination for live music. The reach and commercial opportunity of festivals makes them a very serious business. The non-disposable moments at festivals carry so much weight. They are unforgettable, water-tight, locked-down emotional memories that as a brand, you want to access and be associated with,” says Alasdhair Willis.

For fashion labels, the Coachella festival can be one of the powerful marketing platforms. However, let’s not forget that ‘sharing’ on social media, is critical. There is still a large group of audience you can’t reach. After all, if it didn’t appear on my Instagram, it didn’t exist.