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Home Case Studies Serving up sweet inspiration
A person holding a document with colorful diagrams, while sitting indoors. The image has orange and yellow geometric overlays, and the focus is on the paper, with the persons face blurred in the background.

Serving up sweet inspiration

International Dairy Queen had an ambitious vision: modernize the brand, transform the internal culture, increase collaboration and performance, and drive innovation. And they had to navigate all this while moving into a new headquarters.

IMPACT

International Dairy Queen transformed their headquarters into a visually striking area, infusing inspiration and motivation into the team’s everyday experience.

Industry

Consumer goods and services

Problem space

Employee engagement

Services

Communications

Recognition

Technology

Engagement platform

Modernize the brand, transform the culture

International Dairy Queen (IDQ) had an ambitious vision: Modernize the brand. Transform the internal culture. Increase collaboration and performance. Drive innovation. And navigate all this while moving into a new headquarters.

We had an appetite for challenge. The plan: infuse this transformation not only into the minds and hearts of the IDQ team, but also the environmental space within the new headquarters.

Thoughtful design

The first solution was an office environment that addressed both utility (supporting the functional ways in which work gets done) and desire (driving performance and engagement in a way that promotes the ideal culture).

We hit on both principles with a design campaign aimed at rewiring how employees work and inspiring a high-performance mindshift. Through branded aesthetics, inspiring creative and strategic motivational messaging, each element of the space – from conference rooms to walls and hallways – reflected the new, invigorated culture.

Next up, creating a culture of recognition, celebrating, and rewarding high performance. We developed WOW, a rewards program aimed at driving behaviors around the IDQ values. The energetic and compelling creative brought the values to life, while a strategic launch aligned and activated both managers and employees.

A rewards program that energizes

The result: an exciting cultural shift that’s visually striking but goes far beyond aesthetics to infuse inspiration and motivation into the team’s everyday experience. Now that’s pretty sweet.

3D wall art in vibrant colors reads Lets MAKE Happy in an office hallway, with a purple, yellow, and red color scheme. Another sign with unreadable text hangs further down the hallway.
A wall mural with phrases about happiness, an orange background, and a large smiling sun face with radiating lines, next to motivational text and the words “Let’s Make Happy” in bold letters.
A laptop displays an employee recognition platform with user badges and achievements. To the right, a close-up shows six colorful circular badges with titles like WOW MVP, Circle of Play, and Making the Day.
Large teal letters on a white wall read, “TO CREATE POSITIVE MEMORIES FOR ALL WHO TOUCH DQ,” alongside red letters stating, “THE WORLD’S FAVORITE QUICK-SERVICE RESTAURANT,” with “MISSION | VISION” in circles between them.

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