The Massey Ferguson 50th celebratory party

A quirky online campaign for Massey Ferguson Agricultural Machinery.

This takes the form of a new microsite which explores playfully the history of this large company now in its 50th year of producing agricultural vehicles, most notably its tractors. The campaign was to appeal to customers and staff whom were keen to have some fun while celebrating such an established company.

Bi-monthly, the staff of ‘Massey Ferguson’ are seen in party mode, gathered to welcome customers to help celebrate one of the six decades in the company’s history. The site is therefore updated to present games & quizzes, downloads & memorabilia relating to that decade, all with an agricultural twist; we have ‘get off my land’ shooting gallery for the 50s and ‘crop invaders’ for the 70s, amongst others.

The 1950's Carnival Shooting Gallery

Staff members were keen to get involved and some members could exploit their drama skills by introducing us to each decade in the costume of the time (see above: punk rocker from the early eighties) In the ‘Massey People’ section employees tell the user of their time at the company and the changes they had witnessed. More usually the staff are seen indulging in party games, dancing or simply cheering on the user to enter the party.

Users from all over the world (the site is localised into 11 languages) can play games for prizes, enter competitions, upload their memories about a past product or service or simply immerse themselves in the experience and hopefully share in the humour of the site

The site was built in Flash which allowed us to really recreate an interactive environment with video elements and stop frame animation while allowing us to build immersive games and interactive elements. The party theme allows us to explore the fun of sounds music and frivolity; users are notified of updates via party invitations and preloading screens are represented by candles on the cake.

Photography and video shoots took place at Massey Fergusons’ headquarters in Coventry, Warwickshire directed by Paul Trainor & John Adams. The site was built using Actionscript by John Cotterell & Philip Hodges and database work in PHP was by Andy Bleach. Further illustrations and animations by Tom Judd & Michael Davies.