Sjoerd from the vlog ‘Happy with Sjoerd’ is Albert Heijn’s happiest employee. He also has Down’s Syndrome, but that doesn’t stop him from becoming Holland’s favourite vlogger and reporter. He travels across the entire country to find happy stories for his fans, and to help Albert Heijn out in making ‘Everybody Appie’.

During Halloween, he’ll get you the best pumpkin carving tips. For New Year’s Eve, he made sure all his fans would be safe with great firework safety advice. Sjoerd also doesn’t shy away from adventure. There was an episode where he acted as a stuntman, and once he even jumped out of an airplane. Sjoerd will do anything to make sure his fans are happy and entertained.

We handle an outside-in editorial approach. Culture first. Brand second. For each episode, we’ll observe what’s happening in the Netherlands. Custom data tools, social media mining, and spotting trends are input for this process.

Or we just listen to our vlog’s star, Sjoerd. His way of experiencing the world is culture too. Once he really wanted to go go-karting. So we did and linked it to a national F1 racing event.

‘Happy with Sjoerd’ weekly episodes are shared on multiple social channels, such as Facebook and YouTube, as well as on Appie Today’s own website. Through our own media player, the content is distributed on these various platforms, targeted at & tailored to the right audience.

Since launching ‘Happy with Sjoerd’ we’ve produced 31 vlogs. It became a national hit on social media with over 20 million views, of which 6 million are ‘Appie Views’ (views of longer than 30 seconds). Research showed that watching Appie Today videos significantly positively impacts audience’s attitude towards Albert Heijn’s brand.

In a world of picture perfect vloggers, everyone loves Sjoerd. Not only has he built up a fanbase consisting of customers and fellow colleagues, he’s also been able to win over the hearts of fellow celebrities in The Netherlands. Including the Dutch State of Secretary, complimenting Sjoerd (and Albert Heijn) on national television. ‘Happy with Sjoerd’ also received incredible TV exposure on a major late-night television program; Jinek.

So even though Sjoerd is a bit different, he’s has proven to everyone that he is the perfect vlogger. And more importantly for Sjoerd, he’s well on his way to fame!

Supermarket chain Albert Heijn’s content format ‘Happy With Sjoerd’ is the embodiment of Albert Heijn’s creed ‘Everybody Appie’: to make everybody happy. The feelgood content series starring Down’s syndrome stock boy Sjoerd has an irresistible effect on people. You just can’t watch it without getting a smile on your face. Always optimistic, happy, joking around, and interested in whatever situation he’s in, Sjoerd takes us on funny, moving, inspiring and beautiful little stories as the vlogger he always wanted to be. A truly talented employee of Albert Heijn, both on and off the screen.

Like every company nowadays, Albert Heijn was looking for an influential vlogger to talk to their social audience about food, their supermarket and everything that’s happening in culture. We aimed at finding someone who speaks to the young audience. The vlogs should be in a recognizable style: recognizable as vlogger content, but also as something coming from Albert Heijn. We needed something that linked those two worlds together.

Instead of recruiting one of the ‘traditional’, picture-perfect vloggers we know from social media, we created our own influencer. We needed someone with a contagious sense of optimism, someone who is the embodiment of ‘Everybody Appie’.

During Sjoerd’s recruitment process, we spotted something in his application. His ambitions reached further than being a stock clerk at Albert Heijn. Sjoerd wanted to become famous. So we decided to give him a chance with his very own vlog: “Happy with Sjoerd”.

Supermarket chain Albert Heijn aims to connect customers, suppliers, and employees in a way that makes everyone happy: 'Everybody Appie'. Going the extra mile, doing more than offering great choice in products, prices, service, and quality. However, many people don’t know about these extra initiatives. That’s why online broadcasting channel Appie Today was created; in order to tell these types of stories to the different audiences. It’s a social broadcast channel full of original, entertaining & inspiring formats.

One of these stories that Albert Heijn wants to share is that they employ and empower over 2000 young disabled employees. These are employees that are usually not given the opportunity to work by other large corporations. Albert Heijn wanted to show that they do believe in the value of special needs people and wanted to build awareness around this.