Description

Simple Group is a wine distributor. For its corporate clients and private VIP buyers, it annually publishes the Gift Catalog.
This is a full-color illustrated magazine featuring a selection of gift solutions based on wines, spirits, and wine accessories. Each year, the catalog is designed with its own unique concept. In addition to the print edition, there is also a digital version.
To draw clients’ attention to the catalog, Simple Group organizes a conceptual event dedicated to it every year. This case describes such an event that took place in Moscow and St. Petersburg in 2024.
PROJECT BACKGROUND
The 2024 edition was conceptually designed as a catalog of art objects. The chosen visual style was unusual: a combination of avant-garde realism and 3D design. This approach highlighted key features of the brand — a modern outlook on development and openness to innovation.

There is much more in common between wine and art than it may seem at first glance. Like paintings, wine undergoes a meticulous process of creation, framed in a bottle and a label. To navigate art, one needs a trained eye; in wine, this translates into tasting experience.
As in art, only the finest examples make it into a catalog. Simple Group has selected the best of the best and brought them together in its very own Gift Solutions Catalog. The result is more than a standard product catalog. It is a quintessence of wine and paintings, of artistic framing. An album worthy of the VIP status of the brand’s clients — company owners and top managers, heads of government agencies, socialites , and collectors.

Another feature of art is its social nature. Discovering, studying, and discussing it is customary to do in company — at major exhibitions and biennales.
For the presentation of the new catalog, Simple Group chose precisely this path.
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Event Details
To convincingly bring the biennale theme to life, we used authentic art venues and granted guests access to the actual exhibitions hosted in these galleries.
We also applied modern visual technologies: a projection drum and a digital canvas. On these, the catalog was presented as a multimedia art object.
The biennale opened with a dance performance, built — like most of the catalog’s creative imagery — on the deconstruction of form.
Every detail of the venue reflected the style of the new SIMPLE catalog and was enhanced through interactive activities. Among them:
• a workshop on creating inflatable figures in the spirit of art innovator Jeff Koons,
• a workshop on crafting art keychains,
• and digital sketching of guest portraits in the recognizable manner of neo-impressionist Jean-Michel Basquiat.
The event took place at the Beriozka Contemporary Art Gallery in St. Petersburg, as well as at a prestigious art space in Moscow (under a non-disclosure agreement, we cannot disclose the name of the venue).
Project Goals (Economic)
• Sales target: a 30% increase in sales compared to the previous year.

Project Goals (Social)
Simple set an ambitious task — to organize an event that would help achieve the following aims:
1. Bring together an elite audience at the brand’s event.
2. Present gift solutions to the audience across different beverage categories and price segments.
3. Create a space for informal communication between sales managers, guests, and company clients.
4. Strengthen the perception of Simple as an expert service and distributor of unique products.
5. Increase loyalty by demonstrating a high level of event execution and a well-crafted presentation of the offering.

Target Audience
• Private (VIP, SWP) and corporate Simple clients (decision-makers);
• Successful men and women aged 35–60 with high or very high income;
• Business owners and top managers, heads of government agencies, socialites, collectors, procurement directors, and managers.

Project Tasks
The main task of the project was to present the 2024 Catalog with dignity — to a highly sophisticated audience. To achieve this, it was necessary to design an event that not only aligned with the catalog’s concept but also significantly amplified it.

Creative Concept

EVENT IN THE FORMAT OF A BIENNALE
If the wine catalog is a modern art album of “art objects,” then its presentation should look like the year’s major art event — a biennale of contemporary art. We developed this idea and invited a respectable audience to the Biennale of Gift Solutions.
The event took place at the Beriozka Contemporary Art Gallery in St. Petersburg, as well as at a prestigious art venue in Moscow (under a non-disclosure agreement, we cannot reveal the location).
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Main Stages of Project Implementation (Chronological Order)
DESIGN
1. The event’s Key Visual revealed the theme of the biennale while linking with the cover of the new catalog.
2. All zones of the venue, enhanced by lighting and multimedia projections, reflected the catalog’s core style — avant-garde realism.
3. Venue décor incorporated 3D objects, colors, and textures from the catalog.
4. Bar décor was executed in layered “3D.” The backdrop colors and protruding elements mirrored how categories were presented in the new catalog.

ANNOUNCEMENT
Guests received an animated digital invitation with the program preview, as well as a reference guide to the dress code.

ACTIVITIES
1. The event opened with a musical performance based on the deconstruction of form — echoing the imagery of the catalog.
2. The sense of attending an avant-garde art event was amplified by exhibitions accessible to the guests. In Moscow, these featured the classics of the Russian avant-garde: V. Mayakovsky and V. Meyerhold. In St. Petersburg, the focus was on contemporary art experiments with augmented and virtual reality, stereo sound design, interactive floor, and video art.
3. Guests were immersed in the avant-garde and 3D creativity through workshops: creating inflatable miniatures of animals in the spirit of Jeff Koons; fortune-telling with the legendary Golden Edition Salvador Dalí Tarot; and transforming their own photos into paintings in the style of Jean-Michel Basquiat — one of the most iconic contemporary artists.
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Content Concept
1. 3D elements from the catalog’s category divider pages became the foundation for multimedia art projections and animated visuals. Spheres, ribbons, crystals, and other figures moved, shimmered in different colors, and transformed, creating a unique atmosphere at the venue.
2. Each catalog category was matched with its own projection block, supported by synchronized lighting in the hall. The blocks were separated by animated transitions.
3. The host of the evening introduced the Gift Catalog and guided the audience through its categories.
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Technical Solutions
1. Development of 3D animations for screen displays.
2. Design of venue décor elements using 3D objects.
3. AI programming for transforming guest photos into the style of Jean-Michel Basquiat.
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Communication with Target Audiences
Attendance was by special invitation only, available to members of the Simple Privé Club at Gold+ and Platinum levels, who received personal invitations through mail from their dedicated managers.

Project Results (Qualitative)
The event generated significant interest within the social community. It was attended by around 400 guests in St. Petersburg and about 800 in Moscow. Guests demonstrated a high level of engagement in the program, and as a result, the percentage of client requests to SIMPLE managers for items from the gift catalog grew noticeably compared to the previous year.
Project Results (Quantitative)
● 94% of invited guests attended the event in both St. Petersburg and Moscow.

● The number of client requests to SIMPLE managers for items from the gift catalog increased by 48% in St. Petersburg and 54% in Moscow compared to the previous period.

● Sales in the P&C (Private and Corporate clients) channel grew by 126% in St. Petersburg and 65% in Moscow compared to the same period in 2023.

● 1,400,000 people was the total reach of UGC content from the event in St. Petersburg. (In Moscow, reach data was not recorded.)

Credits

Aleksey Korolev, Creative Strategist at Beetl
Alina Matuhina, Lead Customer Service Manager
Nelia Strahova, Special Events Manager