Jones Soda Co., Seattle, announced a groundbreaking advancement in its augmented reality (AR) program with a proprietary new platform developed for Jones by Clio Award-winning creative agency August Allen. The new innovation expands on Jones’ legacy featuring fans on their labels, bringing video storytelling into a mobile first AR experience.

This unique solution improves on Jones’ REEL LABELS program, launched in 2021, with a faster, seamless user experience that uses mobile AR instead of app-based technology. It also features ability to take the AR experience beyond the bottle into media, merchandise and point of sale.

Featuring a fully-custom designed administrative dashboard, Jones can build, manage, and change AR projects and campaigns of all kinds in-house. This flexibility enables the team to respond faster to culture, customer and fan feedback. Jones’ AR campaigns have been so successful that its crossover brand, Mary Jones, also will soon follow suit with AR labels in the infused cannabis category, the company says.  

“We have always taken a highly personalized approach with Jones labels,” said Curt Thompson, director of marketing at Jones, in a statement. “It has included fan-designed art, special label campaigns, and other fresh ideas unseen in the beverage industry before us. The new technology August Allen built for Jones takes this idea to the next level and allows us to celebrate our community in video on our packaging and unlock new ways to share their stories.”

Kristina Veltri, director of marketing of August Allen, added: “Traditionally, brands like Jones needed to rely on third-party vendors and agencies to create AR campaigns, and each campaign had to be created from scratch every time. Now, Jones can tap into AR on its own, make changes on the fly, test in new communities, and instantly adapt to delight and engage its audiences.”

AR has superseded other engagement channels for Jones. The new AR technology platform created for Jones by August Allen is being implemented now, with Jones expanding into AR posters for PRIDE this year.