Sleep Country has responded to IKEA’s “u up?” campaign with strategic billboards saying “Sorry was asleep.” The brand aims to build on the retailer’s campaign momentum with OOH ads in Montreal and Toronto’s Gardiner Expressway, near the IKEA store in Etobicoke.

Launched on Feb. 14, IKEA’s campaign aimed to capture the attention of Canadians looking for solutions to better sleep, especially those who were awake in the middle of the night scrolling through Instagram. The retailer sent DMs to 500 users, offering a free mattress to some of them and a 15% discount on products to all. As part of the campaign, IKEA also partnered with social media influencers and launched OOH ads, with Carat handling the media buy.

Mark Orton, senior director of media and client service at Kingstar Media (agency handling media buying for the campaign), tells MiC that OOH was key to showcase Sleep Country’s nimble response in a big way. Plus, IKEA’s campaign included an OOH component, so the brand wanted to meet the audience where they were already.

Meanwhile, Vini Dalvi, CCO of creative agency Publicis Toronto, tells MiC that the billboards allowed them to have a presence in close proximity to IKEA stores, conveying the message that “when you’re set up for a good night’s sleep you won’t be up in the middle of the night texting or DMing anyone.”

He says that when IKEA launched the campaign, the team knew they needed to respond, but with the most sleep-friendly approach possible.

“There’s a little bit of ‘inside baseball’ here, for sure, reaffirming our status as leaders in the category, but we also needed to make sure the average person who hasn’t seen IKEA’s ad still gets the idea,” he says. “We love these opportunities to be playful: so many Canadians are familiar with the disruption of late-night DMs keeping them up, but may not think about the impact that has on their sleep.”

Dalvi adds that leveraging sleep-focused campaigns like IKEA’s are a good way to raise awareness about Sleep Country, particularly among an audience who may be unfamiliar with the brand. Conveying a sleep message through OOH also makes Sleep Country more relevant to a larger audience as more brands enter the sleep conversation.

“It is a real sign of how important sleep is becoming in the broader cultural conversation,” Dalvi says.

The campaign also includes social media promotion to extend the work digitally and keep the conversation going.