In this series, features and series developer Heather Nicholls takes you behind the scenes of some of the most compelling brand activations and events.
This week we meet NPK Productions, the agency behind WHIMZEES and Wellness CORE’s stands at Crufts.
The Brief:
Crufts is one of the most influential events in the global pet industry, attracting thousands of dog owners, breeders, trainers and pet enthusiasts across four days. For Wellness Pet Company, the opportunity was to showcase two distinct brands – WHIMZEES and Wellness CORE – all within a single stand environment that could educate, engage and drive commercial performance.
The challenge wasn’t simply to create a visually impactful stand. The space needed to support multiple objectives simultaneously: brand awareness, product education, sampling, retail sales, social sharing and visitor engagement, while ensuring each brand maintained its own identity.
NPK Productions interpreted this as an opportunity to design a visitor journey rather than a traditional exhibition stand and this was brought to life across 2025 and 2026.
Jules Brogan, co-founder at NPK Productions, explains: “At a show like Crufts, attracting attention is only the starting point. The real challenge is creating an environment that encourages visitors to stop, engage, learn and ultimately act. We approached the project by thinking about behaviour first and design second. Every touchpoint was designed to support a different stage of the visitor journey, from discovery and interaction through to product exploration, purchase and social sharing.”
The Execution
The project was led collaboratively by NPK co-founders Jules Brogan and Franck Tetu, who worked together from concept development through to on-site delivery.
One of the key challenges was bringing two established brands together within a single footprint. WHIMZEES and Wellness CORE each have their own personality, audience and product story, so it was important that both could stand confidently in their own right while still feeling part of a cohesive overall experience.
Rather than creating separate destinations, NPK developed a unifying creative framework centred around canine wellbeing, enrichment and the joy pets bring to everyday life. The result was a connected environment that encouraged visitors to naturally explore both brands while maintaining clear brand distinction.
From the outset, the creative concept and fabrication strategy were developed in parallel. This ensured the stand could deliver on the creative ambition while supporting the practical realities of a high-footfall consumer event, including product sampling, retail sales, stock storage and team operations.
Franck Tetu, co-founder at NPK, said: “The stand needed to do a lot within a relatively compact footprint, and it had to be adaptable for two shows in 2025 from Crufts at the NEC to Pet Show LIVE at London Olympia. Every element had to earn its place, whether it was creating visual impact, supporting visitor engagement or helping the client’s team operate efficiently throughout the show. By considering fabrication and functionality from the earliest design stages, we were able to create a space that felt effortless for visitors whilst working incredibly hard behind the scenes.”
For 2026, a new standout feature was the custom Catch the Chew WHIMZEES digital game, designed specifically around the brand and its products. The interactive experience encouraged participation via a one-time show offer, increased dwell time and provided a fun and memorable way for visitors to engage with the brand, while providing all important data capture for the client.
Alongside the game, NPK incorporated a series of highly visual, brand-led photo opportunities that encouraged user-generated content and social sharing. The stand even attracted the eye of Crufts co-host Claudia Winkelman, who was stopped in her tracks while heading to a segment shoot and shared that she feeds her pooches Wellness CORE. These moments helped extend the activation beyond the exhibition hall, turning visitors into advocates and amplifying the brands’ presence throughout the event.
At the centre of the activation sat products and POS for both WHIMZEES and Wellness CORE enhanced through LED accents and digital screens. Each brand featured a dedicated photo opportunity and gamification elements across both years which have include Plinko, custom Maze and a custom Piaggio Apes WHIMZEES promo-vehicle, as well as giant astro-turf finished letters for those special photo moments and a Breeder Café for VIP guests complete with seating area and refreshments.
Reflecting on the collaboration, Dan Constance, country director UK & Ireland at Wellness Pet Company praised NPK’s ability to bring the vision to life: “Working with NPK Productions played a key role in bringing our vision to life. They developed a stand theme that worked perfectly to tie WHIMZEES and Wellness CORE together, while still allowing each brand to stand out in its own right. Their ideas helped create a space that felt cohesive, engaging and unmistakably on brand.”
Wellness Pet also highlighted the team’s attention to detail and proactive approach: “Beyond the creative concept, NPK’s innovation around functionality really set the stand apart. Their attention to detail was exceptional, from the dressing and precise positioning of elements to proactively identifying and resolving potential challenges before they arose. This combination of creativity, craftsmanship and foresight made a real difference to the final result.”
The Results
The stand delivered consistently strong footfall and engagement throughout the event, attracting visitors from across the pet community and maintaining a high level of activity across all four days.
The bespoke WHIMZEES digital game proved particularly successful in driving participation and interaction, while the branded photo opportunities generated significant social sharing, extending the reach of the activation beyond the physical footprint of the stand.
Visitors spent meaningful time engaging with the brands, exploring products and interacting with the Wellness Pet Company team. Feedback was overwhelmingly positive, with attendees commenting on the welcoming atmosphere, engaging activations and intuitive layout.
Importantly, the stand also performed strongly from a commercial perspective. The carefully planned visitor journey allowed the client team to move naturally from conversation and education into product sampling and purchase, supporting both engagement and sales objectives.
Dan Constance commented: “The stand performed extremely well throughout the show, generating strong footfall and consistently high levels of engagement. We had a great mix of meaningful conversations, and the overall energy on the stand remained high across all days.”
He added: “The stand not only attracted attention but worked hard commercially, making Crufts a very successful event for us.”
For Brogan, the project’s success came from balancing creative storytelling with commercial purpose, she said: “The most successful event experiences are the ones that work on multiple levels. Visitors should feel entertained and inspired, but the experience also needs to support real business objectives. By designing around behaviour and thinking carefully about how people interact with a space, we were able to create an environment that delivered value for both the audience and the brand.”
The project demonstrates how thoughtful experiential design can bring multiple brands together, create memorable audience moments and support measurable business outcomes, proving that at events like Crufts, visibility is only the beginning.
