The Athlete’s Foot launches back to school gaming campaign

The Athlete’s foot will be the first Australian retailer to launch a game on the Roblox platform. The game introduces the world of “Fitopia” and aims to encourage kids to engage with school life and build excitement for their return to the classroom – and the school yard.

According to The Athlete’s Foot, “Fitopia brings the best parts of going back to school life in a fun and educational way, giving your kid(s) the opportunity to win on day one.”

Fitopia features three separate games based in a virtual oversized land of school objects. The games are set in a variety of themed locations. The first game sees players challenged by brain twisters and puzzles in a giant classroom. The second game is set out in the schoolyard where players interact with a variety of in-game sporting activities. The third game takes the players on a virtual school camp with obstacle courses for their avatars to navigate, inspired by The Athlete’s Foot 3D Fit experience.

Players entering the world of Fitopia will find their avatars loading into a lobby resembling The Athlete’s Foot Store.

The game is paired with an offer from the store. The website reads, “To celebrate Fitopia and Back to School, when shopping at The Athlete’s Foot, in-store or Online, each of your kid(s) will receive a Keyring and a unique code to unlock extra features in Fitopia with each school shoe purchase.”

Fitopia was developed in collaboration with digital agency LeapFrogger.

“From concept to testing, this has been a fantastic project to be a part of with The Athlete’s Foot,” LeapFrogger managing partner Dim Nedanovski said. “The connection between the instore experience and the game has been very important to everyone involved and we feel the final execution does a great job of rewarding and challenging back-to-school kids – arguably the most important family members in most households.”

Roblox has over 43 million daily active users, with over 200 million monthly users. 67 of users are under the age of 16 with their largest age group 9-12 year olds at 29 percent.

While The Athlete’s Foot is the first Aussie retailer to take advantage of this huge market, this is not the first instance of interactive video game marketing. Instead, the market is booming. The kids metaverse has seen Gap, American Eagle, Nike, Ralph Lauren, Gucci, Claires, and Walmart launch online experiences on Roblox over the past year. Roblox’s user generated content model allows anyone to sign up for free. Roblox offers more than 32 million digital experiences via 12 million creators.

“Innovation is at the core of everything we do at The Athlete’s Foot, first with our exclusive in-store fitting technology and now in the metaverse,” The Athlete’s Foot General Manager Ian Taunton said. “We hope to be able to bring a new experience that adds genuine value to our community, whilst also continuing to reinvent the retail experience in Australia.”

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