Male Gen-Z, Millennial Media Opps: Dave & Buster's launches first national campaign (Score 72)

Dave & Buster's (D&B) has been very busy in 2020 despite the dent coronavirus has put in in the chain's business this year. First it hired SVP & CMO Brandon Coleman in February 2020, who then named Mother NY creative AOR. It is now releasing the first work from the agency in its first ever national advertising campaign, titled "Ding Ding Ding." The campaign will be supported across national TV, digital and social media. The agency is also updating the brand with new a logo, typographic system and graphic language. 

According to Adbeat, out of the $1.8m D&B spent on digital display ads since September 2018, it only spent $120.2k (7%) in this channel after September 2019. It placed 94% of these as video ads through YouTube onto youtube.com. It placed 6% of these ads programmatically through Google DV360 onto sites such adultswim.com, cwtv.com, cartoonnetwork.com, cwseed.com and cmt.com. 

According to iSpot, D&B spent around $22.6m on national TV ads YTD, about half (49%) of the $45.8m  it spent in this channel during the same time period of 2019. Full-year spend equaled $74.3m in 2019 and $64.8m in 2018. It placed ads this year during programming such as "NBA Basketball," "SpongeBob SquarePants," "College Basketball," "South Park" and "Ridiculousness."

Sellers-- D&B mainly targets Gen-Z and millennial parents with a slight male skew through digital display and national TV ads. D&B halted TV ads in mid-March as it had to close its restaurants due to coronavirus.It places social media ads onto Facebook, per Pathmatics. It also invests in local OOH, print and radio ads, per Kantar. Sellers should reach out soon in order to capture last-minute campaign ad dollars. 

Agency & martech readers-- D&B has a relatively new CMO, and agency hires are known to follow one another. Media Assembly is providing media buying services and Mother NY takes care of creative work. You will most likely have the best chance of securing digital or social media work from this company.