| Company Name | ITW Food Equipment Group |
| Project Name | Mixed Up Jake |
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Everyone who’s used a Hobart mixer knows that they’re awesome. The brand has been around for 100+ years and has a solid reputation, but they wanted to freshen up their image and appeal more to the younger culinary crowd. So they asked us to help them transform the way people think about Hobart.
We took into account the interests of the hip young chef crowd, looked at the way they use social media sites, and worked in close collaboration with Hobart. Before long, a conceptual cool guy—MixedUpJake—was born, complete with a blog to highlight examples of Hobart mixers turned into custom works of art.
Sure, Jake is fictional, but we really developed his personality on the blog so he is an engaging character with whom younger mixer users can identify. On the blog, he shares his mixer artwork, photos of others’ custom mixers, ideas and recipes and inspires mixer users to tune up and refurbish their own Hobarts. Once the blog had gained some traction, we created a complete site that gives users a chance to design their own custom mixers, which they can purchase or share on Facebook.
MixedUpJake.com and the custom mixers have garnered media attention, being featured on blogs like Uncrate, The Next Web and Serious Eats. Also, two of the MixedUpJake customized mixers have been auctioned off on eBay, each one generating over 3,000 views. One super popular custom mixer was the Dare Devil’s Food mixer, a bespangled, bestriped, All-American creation inspired by Evil Knievel. The proceeds went to charity.
Of course we also made Jake (like all hipsters) easily accessible through email, Facebook and Twitter. With a growing list of dedicated followers, Jake’s campaign has “stirred up” serious interest…fans have even contacted the site to ask for custom work.
In 2011, to commemorate the opening of the new Charm City Cakes West in LA, we created a mixer, The Dough Rider, just for Duff and the crew. We sent Duff a flip camera and large crate with the mixer inside. In return, Duff sent back a video documenting the opening of the crate. Gizmodo called it, "The Baddest Cake Mixer You've Ever Seen."
Watch The Dough Rider arrive at Charm City Cakes on Vimeo.
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