Feast of the senses at experiential Samsung event

In the age of foodography, social etiquette such as putting the phone away during meals doesn't apply to avid Instagram food photographers. To showcase the food photography features on Samsung's Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus models, the brand carried out a product familiarisation "Let’s Gold" campaign with events agency Pico this summer.

The event was held at the Michelin-starred Ya Ge Restaurant in Mandarin Oriental Taipei and guests had the chance to experience the AR and VR functions of the phone. Cameras on Samsung’s smartphone models are known for their ‘Food’ mode that automatically adjusts the colour to make food photos look more appetising.

The main objective of the event was to allow guests to interact with the food beyond mere consumption and the usual fine dining experience. At the start of the meal, guests were greeted by the AR emoji avatar of executive chef Tse Man who made several appearances throughout the meal.

The AR part of the campaign required guests to scan the QR code on the bowl for the ingredients and preparation process to come alive on their screens. Pico had earlier shot the cooking process with the phone’s super slow-mo feature and edited it into a ‘Feast of Food and Technology’ clip.

Pico documented the entire food preparation process with the phone’s super slow-mo function. Food ingredients and preparation process of the six-course meal came alive on the screen once the guests took a photo of the food.  The experience was completed by a VR view of marine life created by the Pico team.

About 350 influencers, food bloggers, journalists and selected Samsung VIPs from its CRM were invited to join in the experience during the month-long campaign.

Naturally, the heart of the activities in the campaign was to create shareable moments. Photos taken by the phones as well as video footage recorded by Samsung were later shared with guests as a token of their participation.

At the end of the campaign, 67% of guests said they were inclined to post content from the event on their social media accounts. An overwhelming 80% of the participants said they were highly impressed with the phone’s features while a further 72% enjoyed the interactive element of the event.

Pico said ‘favourable publicity’ led the restaurant to offer the experience at part of a meal package to its guests during the last two weeks of the campaign.