Sounders FC

HISTORY IN THE MAKING

By winning the Western Conference Final, the Sounders FC made history. They’d beaten the best team in the league and were preparing to host the MLS Cup for the first time ever. Seattle’s a soccer town, but when you’re asked to help drastically increase fan engagement in just a few days, you have to get creative.

RALLYING THE FAITHFUL. AND THEN SOME.

Our job was to build fever-pitch excitement for the match and rally leading up to it. We had to capture the imagination of the city and ensure all eyes were on this unmissable moment.

To get there, we created a multifaceted campaign designed to fuel massive anticipation. One that would play out across a range of activations, from video content and environmental design to shareable grassroots and experiential tactics—both in the stadium and around the city.

The campaign needed to make clear that history would be made with this event, not just for the Sounders faithful but for the entire city. This was about hometown pride to the nth degree, as hosts and participants in the largest event in US soccer, the MLS Cup.

At the core of the campaign was our tagline: “This. Is. It.” A refrain big and bold enough to span all creative executions and encompass every white-knuckle moment that makes up a match of this magnitude. Every sliding tackle, every fingertip save, every jump-out-of-your-seat shot on goal. A rally cry for the whole city to chant in unison, echoing throughout the region and Seattle’s history.

THE FINAL SCORE

• CenturyLink Field had the  largest  attendance for any sporting event in Seattle history.
• The pre-game March to the Match drew an estimated 25,000 fans, with over 6,000 attending the viewing party.