How MullenLowe Stirred up a Caffeinated April Fool’s for GymNation

Since launching in 2017 homegrown UAE fitness brand GymNation has grown to 12 locations, with twelve more in fit-out and over 65,000 members, becoming the UAE’s largest and most successful gym.

Fresh from a management buy-out GymNation is now on the next phase of growth as it expands further across the UAE and the wider region. Mullen Lowe MENA was tasked with evolving GymNation’s brand positioning to de-bunk gym stereotypes and make going to the gym less intimidating, more affordable, accessible, and fun regardless of your fitness goal.

The new positioning focused on positioning GymNation as the region’s movement partner, enhancing the well-being of nations by championing healthy and active lifestyles, promoting the importance of mental health and nurturing the power of positive thinking.

With April Fool’s around the corner and GymNation’s challenger brand mindset, the opportunity to start to communicate the new positioning in a fun and engaging was too good to turn down. Rather than an attention-grabbing stunt MullenLowe wanted to align the creative idea directly to GymNation’s wider ambitions and mindset.

The simple insight was that while not everyone in the Middle East may not have been to a gym (yet), most people have been to a coffee shop. So, what better way to bring to life GymNation’s ambitions than by showing how even going for a coffee could be an opportunity to stay active and improve health and well-being?

Introducing The Daily Grind café, the world’s first fit-café powered by customers and staff, promoting active lifestyles by turning every sip and every bite into a rep including a queuing system that pushes you to run while you wait and espresso's that require some pulling power to grind down fresh coffee beans.

Through a pre-teaser campaign and then creative reveal on 1st April the campaign generated over 170 million impressions across media publications, securing over 500 pieces of coverage around the world, over 1.5 million views across GymNation’s social platforms and even got hundreds of people to sign up (they were rewarded with a free seven-day gym pass).

Loren Holland, founder and CEO, GymNation said, “This campaign was far more than an April Fool’s stunt it shows how creativity can play a major role in helping start to drive a new business proposition and narrative. It’s just the start of what we think will be an exciting few months with creative bravery front and centre to our brand as we continue on our ambition to make going to the gym less intimidating, more affordable, accessible, and fun for everyone regardless of your fitness goal.”

Matt Butterworth, regional managing director of MullenLowe said, “it’s great when you have a brave disruptive client that allows your creativity to flow and works with you as a partner. There is a lot of serious work out there in this region and its fantastic to see, but this just goes to prove that we can have some fun, be creative and work towards creating a disruptive fame making brand that really supports the creative process and team involved.”