Events, Seasonal and Short-Term
Situation Analysis: In the fresh bacon category Maple Leaf is the market leader, but in the emerging fully-cooked bacon category, growing at 9% year over year, Maple Leaf Ready Crisp bacon was suffering from low awareness, limited trial and flat sales. Maple Leaf Ready Crisp Bacon needed to improve on-shelf consumer recognition and trial.
Insight & Strategy: Bacon advertising often catered to a male target, appealing to their carnal desire for meaty, decadent and over-the-top uses of bacon. But the principal grocery shopper is mom. A segmentation study identified a bull’s-eye group of moms – “Carpe Diems” – for whom convenience reigns paramount and food preparation takes a back seat to the rest that life has to offer. A “healthy diet” is not top priority; they want delicious food and believe decadent food choices can be counterbalanced by an active lifestyle. There’s power in bacon. Maybe mom could harness the power of bacon and use it to her advantage by getting her family to roll up their sleeves and help make her days just a bit easier: “Change Your Life With Bacon.”
Execution: Running from July to August, 2013, the campaign consisted of the Facebook tab ChangeYourLifeWithBacon.com, which included four online videos, a downloadable Chore Chart providing suggestions on what bacon recipe would elicit what kind of work around the house, YouTube pre-roll, unpaid promotion through Maple Leaf existing social channels (Facebook, Twitter) together with blogger outreach and press release/media relations. The tongue-in-cheek videos demonstrated how mom could Change Your Life With Bacon by using the smell of it to get her family to do all the things that they should help her with but don’t. An official badge was developed to house the Change Your Life With Bacon claim, anchoring the design system.
Results: The campaign resulted in a 14% gross sales lift versus the same period the previous year. Beyond the paid campaign period, through Q4 2013, sales leveled and rested at 5% higher than the previous year. Awareness of “Change Your Life With Bacon” registered at 42%, versus the 30% objective, relative to well-established competitors Prime (47% awareness) and Schneiders (25% awareness).
Cause & Effect: The only difference between the case period and prior periods was the “Change Your Life With Bacon,” campaign. No incremental spend, promo, distribution or product innovation was used. With over 10 million social impressions registered during the two-month campaign including 2.3 million YouTube views and #ChangeYourLifeWithBacon trending at the #1 spot in Canada, further investment was secured beyond the case period.
Credits:
Client: Maple Leaf Foods
Director, digital & social marketing: Jerry Sen
VP marketing & masterbrands: Chantal Butler
VP integrated marketing: D’Arcy Finley
Director, packaged meats: David Grachnik
Marketing manager, bacon: Brenden Desjardins
Marketing manager, digital: David Alexander
Agency: John St.
ECDs: Angus Tucker, Stephen Jurisic
AD: Denver Eastman
CW: Jacob Greer
Broadcast producer: Anna Neilsen
Account lead: Heather Crawley
Account director: Jared Applebaum
Account executive: Amelia MacGregor
Strategic planner: Allison Coggins
Directors, Aircastle Films: Will Beauchamp, Jamie Cussen
Line Producer, Aircastle Films: Lauren Corber
Editor, Aircastle Films: Anne Feldman
