-196
konbini backroom
✍️
2026
🗓️
Adweek, Billboard, Hypebeast
Our increasingly quirky, laced-down work on -196 organic social earned us the ciient love and opportunity to bring all that flavor offline. We brought -196's strong Japanese heritage, unusual methodology, and bold delicious flavor to life in a big way by taking over a building in NYC and transforming it: a Japanese konbini in the front, and neon-drenched secret party in the back. Featuring an ultra-hype Rebecca Black DJ set in the back. And yeah, she remixed Friday...on a Friday.
Brought to life with help from partner experiential and influencer agencies, the event was a huge success - generating buzz and new trial despite its limited constraints.
And of course, we had to get the word out there with social promo...using engaging organic posts that establish the visual world and launch the tallboy can all at the same time
But the konbini concept is not just about the event. The insight is fundamentally about the connection between two strong convenience store cultures. No two places take their convenience shopping experiences as seriously as Japan and the U.S. Of course, being NYC-based, our main reference point was the ubiquitous corner store or bodega - absolutely requiring a nod in social spots and assets via a cameo from a store cat. But the engagement and discussion around gas station interactions etc. prove how integral these spaces are nationally as well, especially for our core audience. This common ground also ties into one of the key components to our tone of voice for the brand - bringing unusual flavor to an otherwise bland or everyday experience.
To communicate this, we surrounded the event with a suite of social video and evergreen digital campaign produced alongside but built to continue outside of the event. We shot on-site in Tokyo with top comedy creators Kyle (@kylefornow) and Pooja (@winnie_thepooj) bringing our scripts to life with social-native, self-aware humor. Their delivery of our surreal concepts merged perfectly with our set, designed in conjunction with multiple production companies across languages and featuring IYKYK references to our brand, bodega culture, and the event itself.
And now a moment for said set. Production scouted an amazing starting location, a film set reproducing a Japanese konbini in Tokyo itself - but we knew we had to turn it into something more liminal. To prime our American audience for our scripts, we had to first bridge the familiar and the foreign to create our own -196 world. Some of my favorite custom easter eggs:
