Grocer Kaufland is opening a base in Nintendo Switch long-running Animal Crossing: New Horizons.
In cooperation with the Twitch streamer Minimoli, Kaufland is launching its own island in Animal Crossing: New Horizons this Thursday: From 5 p.m. there will be a live stream including a tour of 'Kaufisland'.
The island is managed by avatar Phil Leita – a nod to ‘branch manager’ according to Kaufland. The player grows Animal Crossing fruit, sells groceries, sizzles in an open-air kitchen and chills in the café - flanked by characters such as raccoon dog Tom Nook.
The idea, concept and implementation came from the 1-2-Social agency. Their brief: to promote Kaufland's 'sustainability strategy'. Accordingly, there are virtual parking spaces for bicycles and e-scooters, for example, as well as solar plants and wind turbines.
"In the game, we make sustainability tangible," explains Lavinia Ahmad, who is responsible for sustainability at Kaufland. "Our island shows where the food comes from and what happens to the deposit bottles, for example, when they end up in our deposit machines."
Kaufisland can be reached via the so-called Dreamcode DA-3829-9221-8851 (which is only relevant for you if you actually use the game).
Animal Crossing: New Horizons was also among the best-selling console games in Germany in 2021: more than one million players opted for the build-up game in this country, which was released in April 2020.
Kaufland has recently expanded its marketing activities in the direction of games: Casting for its own e-sports team started in November.