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How Empik Turned Instagram Into a Reading Platform With Storygram
Storygram is a digital campaign created for Empik by Change agency, published in Poland in February 2015, that transformed Instagram's sequential image feed into a reading platform by posting serialised excerpts from unreleased books directly to the account @storygram_empik, according to WARC.
Empik is a major Polish bookseller and retailer operating across books, music, films, video games, stationery, and selected electronics. Competing in an omnichannel retail environment that was shifting rapidly beneath its feet, Empik needed a way to reconnect with readers on the platforms they already inhabited rather than asking them to migrate toward traditional retail touchpoints. The Storygram campaign answered that challenge with disarming simplicity: take the book to the reader, one Instagram post at a time.
The campaign operated through the dedicated Instagram account @storygram_empik, where book excerpts were divided across sequential posts. Users arriving at the account could scroll through the feed and read the content in sequence, effectively consuming a chapter or extended passage without leaving the application. In Poland, where the digital reading market was expanding and social media engagement was becoming a primary leisure behaviour, the mechanic met audiences on their own terms. Documented book examples published through the campaign included Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan, Zielona wyspa by Igor Ostachowicz, and Historia kotów by Madeline Swan, as noted in Clapboard's editorial archive. Participation mechanics encouraged users to follow the account and engage with individual posts, creating an organic discovery loop that linked social behaviour to bookselling intent. The campaign received a Clapboard Score of 60 out of 100, reflecting a genuinely inventive format adaptation that nonetheless leaves questions about measurable commercial impact unanswered, according to Ebibojs Pl.
Empik faced a structural challenge in the Polish retail book market by 2015. According to Instytutksiazki Pl, multimedia stores such as Empik accounted for approximately 21% of Polish book distribution in 2014, a notable contraction from 29% in 2012. Traditional bookshops held 49% of distribution in the same year, per instytutksiazki.pl, signalling that physical book retail remained dominant even as the channel mix diversified. The strategic imperative for Empik was not simply to sell books but to assert cultural relevance in a reading landscape that was increasingly mediated by screens and social feeds.
Change agency, based in Warsaw, identified Instagram as an untapped vehicle for literary discovery. The platform's grid architecture, which presents images in reverse chronological order but allows users to scroll backward through a feed, created an accidental but functional reading mechanism. By formatting book excerpts as image posts and publishing them in sequence, Change effectively converted a social channel built for photography into a serialised reading environment. This was a meaningful act of platform subversion at a moment when competitors in Polish retail were focusing predominantly on conventional e-commerce and loyalty scheme communications.
The Polish e-book market was valued at PLN 56 million in 2014, growing 16.5% year over year from PLN 53.7 million in 2013, according to instytutksiazki.pl. Digital audiobook sales reached PLN 29.2 million in 2014, up 8.5% from PLN 26.9 million in 2013, also per instytutksiazki.pl. These figures confirm that Polish readers were actively migrating toward digital formats, and Storygram positioned Empik as the brand that understood and accelerated that migration rather than resisting it. Against competitors operating in conventional digital retail and catalogue advertising, the campaign staked a distinctly editorial identity for Empik, according to Find-And-Update Company-Information Service Gov Uk.
Storygram's creative execution rested on a deceptively austere production principle: the image is the page, and the feed is the book. The campaign was led by Executive Creative Director Jan Majle and Senior Art Director Dominik Przerwa, with copy direction from Senior Copywriter Marcin Nowakowski, as documented in Clapboard's archive. Client services were managed by Jola Mazurek and Michał Tyburcy. Together this team at Change agency, Warsaw, constructed a format that required as much editorial discipline as it did creative invention.
The visual language of Storygram prioritised legibility over decoration. Each post presented text against a clean, controlled background, ensuring that the reading experience was uninterrupted by excessive graphic complexity. The choice to use Instagram, a platform then associated overwhelmingly with photography and lifestyle imagery, was itself the primary creative statement. By publishing literary prose in that environment, the campaign implicitly argued that reading was as native a social behaviour as sharing a photograph, and that Empik understood both instincts equally well.
The selection of titles demonstrated deliberate editorial curation. Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan carried significant international young adult readership recognition, lending the campaign immediate discoverability among a digitally active demographic. Zielona wyspa by Igor Ostachowicz and Historia kotów by Madeline Swan added Polish-market specificity, grounding the campaign in local literary culture rather than defaulting entirely to globally recognised names. As reported by trendhunter.com, the campaign's approach to reading on Instagram attracted attention as a novel example of platform-native storytelling at the intersection of retail and culture. The sequential post format demanded that users commit to following the account across multiple sessions, building habitual return visits that aligned precisely with Empik's interest in sustained brand engagement rather than single transactional moments.
No verified performance data for the Storygram campaign is publicly available. Engagement figures, follower counts for @storygram_empik, conversion rates, or attributable sales uplift have not been disclosed by Empik or Change agency in any publicly accessible source, and fabricating such figures would misrepresent the campaign's documented record.
What the structural evidence does support is a campaign built with clear behavioural logic. The mechanic of serialised reading across sequential posts creates a return-visit incentive that is architecturally sound: a reader who encounters the first excerpt must follow the account and return to complete the story, generating repeated brand exposure without paid amplification at each touchpoint. In Poland's growing digital reading market, where instytutksiazki.pl recorded consistent year-on-year growth in both e-book and audiobook consumption through 2014, Storygram arrived at a moment when the audience for exactly this kind of digital literary experience was expanding.
The campaign's limitation, and the primary reason its Clapboard Score of 60 out of 100 reflects measured rather than effusive assessment, is that the format's elegance does not automatically translate into commercial accountability. A reader who consumes a chapter on Instagram and does not click through to purchase represents brand exposure without a closed conversion loop. The campaign functions as top-of-funnel awareness and cultural positioning for Empik rather than as a full-funnel retail activation. As an act of creative strategy, Storygram is accomplished. As a commercial performance instrument, it remains unverified by the available record.
Storygram is a digital campaign created for Empik by Change agency in Poland in February 2015. It used the Instagram account @storygram_empik to publish sequential book excerpts as image posts, allowing users to read serialised passages from unreleased titles directly within their Instagram feed without leaving the platform.
Storygram featured excerpts from Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan, Zielona wyspa by Igor Ostachowicz, and Historia kotów by Madeline Swan. These titles were selected to balance international young adult appeal with Polish-market literary relevance, reflecting deliberate editorial curation by the Change agency creative team.
Storygram was created by Change agency, based in Warsaw. The team included Executive Creative Director Jan Majle, Senior Art Director Dominik Przerwa, and Senior Copywriter Marcin Nowakowski. Client services were managed by Jola Mazurek and Michał Tyburcy. The campaign was published in February 2015 for Empik in Poland.
Storygram exploited Instagram's sequential image feed by formatting book text as individual posts published in order. Users following @storygram_empik could scroll through the account to read excerpts in sequence. The mechanic required repeated return visits, building habitual brand engagement and positioning Empik as a culturally relevant retail presence in Poland's growing digital reading market.
When Storygram launched in February 2015, multimedia retailers like Empik held approximately 21% of Polish book distribution, down from 29% in 2012, according to instytutksiazki.pl. The Polish e-book market reached PLN 56 million in 2014, growing 16.5% year over year, per instytutksiazki.pl, signalling an audience actively migrating toward digital reading formats.
Storygram received a Clapboard Score of 60 out of 100. The score reflects the campaign's inventive use of Instagram's native format for serialised literary content and its sound behavioural mechanics, while acknowledging the absence of publicly verified performance data that would confirm its commercial effectiveness as a retail activation for Empik in Poland.
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