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BG BrandLab Playfully Educates Consumers, Businesses On LED Lightbulbs

As it looks to educate consumers and businesses about LED lightbulbs and energy efficiency, Mass Save, a collaborative of natural gas and electric utilities, aims to break down common misconceptions about LED technology. It enlisted the BG BrandLab, the brand studio of Boston Globe Media, to help it deliver the message with a mix of sponsored and provided content.


The “On The Bright Side” campaign, which kicked off in the spring, broke its final piece of content on August 28 — an animated video that highlights the effectiveness of LED bulbs, plus how to look for and shop for them. The effort, which has run on social media and on the Boston Globe’s website, included a quiz and articles with interactive graphics.

The subject posed a challenge: “How do you approach this subject in a creative way and be playful but also have a message?” said Doug Most, head of the BG Brand Lab. Mass Save also created its own content, which was shared on social media and with the Globe readers. While the Globe has been creating branded content for a couple of years, it put more structure around it and organized a brand studio a little more than a year ago.

The BG Brand Lab has a diverse client roster including a hospital, insurance firm, a travel and tourism organization, a national retail brand, and a museum. “We are stepping up efforts to do more interactive content, more immersive content, and we’re pushing to do more video,” Most said. He said some brands don’t even think of themselves as having a story to tell. “It never occurred to them that what they have is interesting.”

Regarding the Mass Save effort, Most said: “We are especially proud of this because it's a creative solution for a brand and a client. We were focused on taking a subject that could be potentially ordinary -- light bulbs -- and addressing how important they are in our everyday lives. And then doing it with a little bit of humor but without losing the very clear messaging about LED bulbs that was imperative for our client.”

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