Recent briefs and projects have got us thinking… there’s a noticeable shift in what clients are asking for, and what audiences expect from brand experiences. It’s less about how big something is, and more about how well it connects.
It feels like there’s a bit of a shift happening in experiential at the moment - and it’s not just about budgets.
For a long time, the go-to answer was: make it bigger. Bigger build, bigger footprint, bigger statement. And don’t get me wrong - that still has a role. But we’re seeing more brands pause and ask, “is bigger actually what we need here?” “Does bigger mean a bigger connection?”
More often than not, the answer is… not really.
What’s starting to take over is something a bit more considered. Less about reaching everyone, more about reaching the right people, in the right way.
And that shift isn’t just coming from brands - it’s coming from audiences too. 63% of UK consumers say they’d rather talk about something they did than something they bought, which tells you everything about where value sits now.
We saw that when delivering an international influencer trip with Stanley Black & Decker’s #Team Black & Yellow event in Billund. It wasn’t about scale for the sake of it, it was about bringing a group of influencers together and creating moments that felt natural, shareable and worth talking about afterwards (and in the moment).
At the other end of the spectrum, you’ve got something like British Airways’ Winter Sun at Battersea Power Station. On paper, that’s a big, bold build - a huge suspended “winter sun”, a full Caribbean takeover in the middle of London. But even there, what people really connected with wasn’t just the size of it. It was everything within it.
Each day felt different, different island takeovers, food and drink tied to that destination, live entertainment, moments to stop, try something, take a photo and enter a competition. That’s what people spent time with. That’s what they remembered.
And that’s where measurement is quietly changing things.
73% of UK consumers say live experiences make them feel more connected to brands, which is great but . . .
...It’s no longer enough just to show up with something big. It has to connect.
When you actually look at what drives engagement - what people share, what they talk about, what they act on.. it’s rarely just the biggest thing in the room. It’s the bit that made them feel something, or pulled them in, or gave them a reason to stay longer than they planned.
So, what we’re seeing now is brands getting more comfortable with that trade-off.
Less pressure to go big for the sake of it, and more focus on what’s actually going to resonate.
Which usually comes down to a pretty simple shift in thinking:
Instead of asking, “how big can we make this?”
It’s becoming, “how good can we make this moment?”
And quite often, that doesn’t mean making it bigger.
It just means being a bit smarter about it.
At Hyphen, we’re all about connection - connecting brands, people and stories in a way that actually lands. Because it’s not the biggest moments that cut through, it’s the ones that people feel, remember and want to talk about.