Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages

Big Win Energy: Designing a Trophy That Travels

OVERVIEW

Dallas-based Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages (CCSWB) is one of the largest Coca-Cola bottlers in the United States, serving happiness to over 31 million folks across the country.

When their employees crushed it in the 2024 Market Street Challenge, CCSWB wanted their team to feel the love with something more personal than a mass email or a token round of applause. That’s where we came in.

The challenge: Create something fun, shareable, and meaningful to highlight their shared success. But how do you celebrate a company-wide win when there’s only one trophy? You make the trophy come to them.

In partnership with our BFFs at Trace Element, we helped CCSWB turn a traditional moment of recognition into an interactive AR experience that felt personal, playful, and perfectly on-brand.

Our Role

Experience & Innovation
Augmented Reality (AR)
3D Modeling
Interactive Design
Social Media

The Idea

Tegan’s creative team designed a custom WebAR (Augmented Reality) experience (read: no app download, no tech drama) triggered by a QR code on a printed postcard. Scan it, and boom — there’s a shiny 3D trophy floating in your selfie, surrounded by confetti, animations, and good vibes. Team members could pose, snap, retake, and share it instantly.

Features We Included:

• 3D Face-Tracked Trophy — Poses like a champ right alongside you

• Confetti & Celebratory Visuals — Because you earned it

• Photo & Share Functionality — Save it, send it, flex it in the group chat

• Preview & Retake Options — For the “wait, my eyes were closed” crowd

• Custom Share Copy & Metadata — Keeps it all on-brand when shared

How We Built It:  From Sketches to Selfies

We started with a quick journey mapping session to outline the user flow and find moments to make it fun and memorable. Then, using just a few reference photos, we modeled the trophy in Blender—carefully matching its size, shape, and texture without any scans.

In 8th Wall, we tested everything: trophy tracking, confetti levels, and performance across devices. We anchored the trophy to the user’s nose bridge for a natural, selfie-ready feel.

To accelerate the build, we leveraged custom GPTs—using AI to generate unique WebAR code and troubleshoot software quirks—giving us shortcuts that sped up prototyping without sacrificing polish.

The Tegan team ran hands-on testing, tweaking the visuals and photo-taking UI until everything felt smooth, fun, and easy to share.

The Result: Trophy Vibes, No Shipping Required

Did we invent the postcard-to-party pipeline? Maybe. Let’s just say the jury’s still out.

But more importantly, we loved being able to give the great folks at CCSWB a smart, fun way to spotlight their team win. (Bonus points for confetti you don’t have to clean up.)

Why It Worked

• No logistical headaches — Just scan and celebrate!

• Instant emotional impact — See yourself with the trophy = feel the win.

• Share-worthy — Recognition moments made for the camera roll.

• Culture-forward — Shows your team you’re embracing new modes of creativity.

• Scalable — Want to do it again? All you need is a QR code.

Last we checked, the confetti is still falling, and the digital trophy is still being passed around. But thankfully, the champagne (and Coke) is still being served analog — as they should. Cheers all around to the amazing CCSWB crew!