Advertising Day 2025: Architecting Attention

On February 12, the 33^rd edition of MAEUR Advertising Day of 2025 took place at The Social Hub in Rotterdam. Following the success of the Trend Event, the Advertising Day proved to be an exciting sequel in MAEUR’s line of events for the second half of the academic year, putting participants to the test with a marketing case competition.

Participants arrived fresh and ready for a challenging yet insightful day at the venue in the morning and by 10:00 AM everyone was seated and ready for an thrilling day ahead.

The event was officially opened by Stella Jonville, the Chairwoman of the Advertising Day Committee. She walked the audience through the purpose and history of this special event, as well as introduced the three companies guiding and assessing participants in the competition - Valantic, Fingerspitz, and Das Buro. For closing, Stella also gave a recap of the Unilever case to be solved by the participants, and the schedule for the rest of the day.

Kicking off the company introductions, Rowan Hullegie and Jari van de Moosdijk took to the stage to present about Valantic, an ambitious digital marketing company, specializing in aiding the digital transformation of companies. They gave a broad overview of targeting and positioning best-practices and how they deploy these in their day-to-day work.

After Valantic, the online marketing agency, Fingerspitz was presented by Paul van der Ven. Hearing the stories behind the company’s award-winning projects for clients such as Mammoet, Nespresso and Cortina, the audience enjoyed an eye-opening crash course on the potential of growth marketing and knowledge sharing.

Next, Das Buro was introduced to students by Dennis van der Meule, one of the founders of this young, out-of-the-box branding firm. He entertained the crowd with a personal story about his early career and how he ended up with Das Buro and creative branding, as well as some facts and figures about the importance of branding on both the long and short term.

Lastly, the representatives of Unilever, Vera Tartoczki Zijlstra and Merel de Jong presented Unilever and gave an eye-opening insight into the FMCG conglomerate’s past, present, and vision for the future. Following the overview of the company, the Unilever associates segued onto the internship and traineeship opportunities available at the company. Concluding their presentation, they introduced a novel brand in their portfolio and the main subject of the marketing case, Shea Moisture.

After the company presentations, it was time for a lunch break with some fruits and sandwiches kindly prepared by the Advertising Day committee, giving students the chance to charge up before the intense case solving challenge.

All fresh and recharged, the competing teams started solving Unilever’s Shea Moisture case. This latest brand’s introduction to the Dutch market constituted the main challenge of the Advertising Day’s marketing case. The participating students tackled the task in eight groups, designing a campaign for the introduction of Shea Moisture to Dutch retailers. The teams had to decide on all 4Ps of the brand’s marketing mix from the product portfolio, selling price, multi-channel promotional campaign, and choice of retailers. During the two hours of hard work, the teams had the chance to ask the company representatives for some guidance.

After having prepared their marketing solutions, the teams took to the podium and presented their unique strategies for the introduction of Shea Moisture to the Dutch market. The teams’ creative case solutions gave the judges a difficult time picking a winner but in the end, Group 1 emerged triumphant with their captivating “Get Ready For The Summer” themed strategy. The storytelling and catering to a broad audience with their inclusive approach made their solution truly stand out to the judges. Congratulations to Lea Kreitz, Sarah Janders, Tina Agravian, Daria Oboymova, and Jenny Cheng on their winning case!

Their success and the eventful day was celebrated and concluded with a couple of drinks in the bar of The Social Hub.

Overall, Advertising Day 2025 leaves participants with an unparalleled experience of learning from industry professionals, gaining new perspectives on branding and marketing strategies, all with a competitive twist. Congratulations to all participants, especially the winning team, the organizers, and a heartfelt thank you to the company delegates of Unilever, Valantic, Fingerspitz, and Das Buro.