Grapefruit and UNTOLD – from record to record or how to sell 40,000 passes for the next edition in just a day

The context and the challenge

Having established itself as one of the world’s most acclaimed festival brands—consistently ranking among the top three international festivals—and standing as one of the top ten Romanian brands with significant global recognition (as well as the first and only Romanian brand named an Ambassador for Romania’s tourism brand), UNTOLD is now entering a new phase of development. The Romanian entertainment group is accelerating its global expansion strategy, aiming to become a key player in the worldwide live entertainment industry.

With over 500,000 attendees across 4 days and 9 stages, UNTOLD’s marketing ecosystem spans dozens of channels (social, paid media, influencers, PR, and ticketing), each generating its own stream of data. In this context, the challenge presented to the agency was twofold: sell out the 2026 edition while simultaneously engineering a flawless, high-velocity launch for UNTOLD 2027 Star Edition, all without losing momentum in the final, most unpredictable days before the festival. An ambitious target, one that the agency pushed hard to achieve, but also a system that is ambitious at its core—just like everything they do.In digital, Grapefruit teams know it’s not a matter of “ifs”, but always a matter of “hows”, and that’s exactly why they believe in the power of dedicated teams. A strategy that works and that also helped Grapefruit and UNTOLD reach their third year of strong partnership, growing from one edition to another and being ready to surprise the industry one more time.

The strategy and the solution

Grapefruit’s team partnered with the UNTOLD team on cross-channel data analysis, translating it into real-time action. Its specialists built a segmented audience strategy with tailored creative and messaging for every phase of the campaign, briefed the creative teams (photo, video, design) to keep every touchpoint on-brand, and coordinated paid media execution across the full funnel.

For the entire festival week, the agency fully dedicated itself to the project and had two dedicated team members on-site at UNTOLD’s office in Cluj-Napoca, working shoulder to shoulder with the client’s team. Irina Petrea (Data Analyst & Marketing Manager) tracked marketing performance against objectives daily basis, while Anca Mitrica (Digital Strategist & Business Development Manager) focused on driving sales. Together, a single, integrated dashboard pulled together social, paid, influencer, PR and ticketing data every day, giving the team the evidence to make calls like reviving a paused campaign at the right moment.

Being on the ground meant feeling the festival get built, hour by hour, alongside the people who make it happen, and reacting the moment the data called for it, not a day later. That closeness, that shared rhythm between Grapefruit’s and UNTOLD’s teams, is what turned a strategy on paper into decisions made in real time.

The Implementation

Execution ran on two parallel tracks. For UNTOLD 2026, Grapefruit’s team monitored the integrated dashboard daily throughout the sales period, reporting findings and recommendations to the client’s marketing team every single day. In the final week before the festival, they spotted an opportunity in campaigns the team had already considered closed, and made the call to reactivate two of them, unlocking meaningful last-minute revenue.

For the UNTOLD 2027 Star Edition launch, the agency designed and coordinated the full paid media rollout around the reveal moment, with audience segments, creative, and messaging pre-built for each phase of the drop. Close, daily collaboration between its strategy team, the client’s marketing department, and creative partners kept every channel aligned from reveal to sellout.

Results

And the final numbers spoke for themselves, revealing the true success of this partnership. UNTOLD 2026 welcomed over 500,000 attendees across 4 days and 9 stages. The reactivated campaigns generated significant, unplanned revenue in the festival’s final days. And the UNTOLD 2027 Star Edition launch became the strongest in the festival’s history: 40,000 passes sold, two sell-outs in 24 hours, half of a two-week sales target reached on day one, and nearly 51% of sales attributed directly to paid media in under 24 hours.

• For UNTOLD 2026 – One Edition: 500,000+ attendees, 4 days, 9 stages
• For UNTOLD 2027 – Star Edition: 40,000 passes sold in a record time from reveal
• 50% of a two-week sales target reached in the first 24 hours
• ~51% of sales driven by paid media in first 24 hours
• Two reactivated campaigns generated meaningful last-minute 2026 revenue

The Conclusion & Next steps

This is only the beginning. Following UNTOLD 2026’s success and the record-setting 2027 launch, Grapefruit’s team is proud to continue and expand the partnership with UNTOLD, one that next year will go even further, materializing into new projects across the client’s wider portfolio. Stay tuned: what’s coming next promises to be even more impactful!