We developed the 5ASIDE5K concept end-to-end: brand design, key partners, PR and press and worked with Brooks and Sports Direct for over four months to bring it to life on Saturday, August 3rd at the flagship store on Oxford Street.
To legitimise our positioning, and tease our partnership with Brooks, we first launched a seasonal sub-brand, Atleti Capitan, a fictional football and run club to enable us to play in the space.
5ASIDE5K meshed the worlds of running and football in a way that we had never seen before. At first glance, it's a fun bit of wordplay on top of a team-based 5K. But there's more to it than that.
A football-coded 5K race on the backdrop of the Olympics and The Euros, during a time when running, globally, is becoming a rapidly rising cultural practice. This begins to show how 5ASIDE5K as a concept is both of the current times while also signalling how running and sport in cities will and can continue to evolve.
For us, 5ASIDE5K was a cross-cultural collision that responds to the current clamour for running but is energised by the eternal spirit of play that football elicits in people. We began asking the question: Is the equivalent of cage football for adults in cities a football-coded 5K run? Perhaps. Because running a team 5K is far easier in 2024 than playing 5-a-side. Due to life scheduling and the pure business of London's urban spaces.
For more granular insights on the activation and collaboration with Brooks, download our case study on 5ASIDE5K here.