YouTube Festival: TUI wins “Brands x Creator Battle”

• Together with creator RobBubble, TUI impresses with innovative AI-powered storytelling and wins the audience vote

• Around 1,500 creators, marketing decision-makers and media professionals gathered at Arena Berlin

• Competition shows how brands, creators and AI are jointly shaping the future of digital storytelling

TUI, together with creator RobBubble, has won this year's "Brands x Creator Battle" at the YouTube Festival. The competition impressively demonstrated what the future of collaboration between brands and creators could look like. In front of around 1,500 guests from the creator, marketing and media industries, TUI and RobBubble developed an innovative advertising spot using Google's latest AI technologies. The audience on site and the online vote held the previous week ultimately named the spot the winner of the competition.

The "Brands x Creator Battle" brought together two brands and two creators to develop attention-grabbing video spots in a very short space of time. Supported by Google's latest Gemini and AI tools as well as the creative content studio 27km, TUI and RobBubble competed against L'Oréal / La Roche-Posay and creator Dani Verdari. The aim was to showcase the creative potential of generative AI and the future of collaboration between brands and creators.

The competition produced two completely different creative concepts. The joint spot by TUI and RobBubble convinced the audience both in the vote ahead of the festival and at the event itself. The decisive factor was the successful combination of authentic creator storytelling, creativity and innovative AI-powered visual effects.

"Congratulations to TUI and RobBubble on winning the Brands x Creator Battle! Your winning spot impressively demonstrates what our 'Human in the Asset' approach on YouTube means: the brilliant combination of authentic creator storytelling with the visual possibilities of GenAI. Creator Robin Blase used AI specifically to enhance real scenes with visual effects. This is exactly where Google's AI tools provide support: they open up new creative scope, expand craft skills and make campaigns highly effective. A real milestone for modern brand storytelling," said Florian Völlmecke, Creative Lead Google Germany.

"Winning the Brands x Creator Battle illustrates what is possible when strong brands, creative creators and innovative technologies come together. Together with RobBubble, we succeeded in combining authentic storytelling with the creative possibilities of AI and developing a spot in a very short time that convinced the audience. On YouTube in particular, creators bring authenticity and platform expertise, while AI opens up new creative scope. The crucial point is this: successful AI-powered communication does not happen at the touch of a button. It requires creative expertise, craftsmanship and the courage to explore new paths," said Christian Bärwind, Director Marketing & Sales TUI Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

"This award confirms our approach of using new technologies in a targeted way for creative brand communication while always placing relevance for our target groups at the centre. My special thanks go to our team at TUI, our partner Google and the team at 27km for the excellent collaboration," added Lars-Hendrik Angerer, Head of Brand Marketing TUI Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

The YouTube Festival is regarded as one of the most important events for the creator economy in the German-speaking region. Around 1,500 creators, marketing decision-makers, agency representatives and media experts came together at Arena Berlin to discuss current developments, trends and innovations in digital content, creator marketing and artificial intelligence.

By winning the "Brands x Creator Battle", TUI underlines the growing importance of creator collaborations and artificial intelligence for modern brand communication. The competition showed how the combination of creator expertise, technological innovation and creative know-how creates entirely new opportunities for developing relevant content. In doing so, creators and AI together provide important impulses for the future of digital marketing and brand storytelling.