Business Problem

Veganuary is over crowded with vegan-pushing messaging.

As one of the UK’s leading meat substitute brands, THIS™ had to have a presence during veganuary. 

It’s the time of year for vegan brands to grow their audience as vast numbers of new omnivores commit to replacing the meat in their diet with plant-based alternatives for a dose of virtue. 

The problem was that loads of vegan brands, and big FMCG brands with new vegan products, were destined to fill the Veganuary airtime. These brands had handsome budgets that enabled them to win on share of voice.

Given their modest budget, If THIS™ were going to sing while the big dogs shouted, they had to do something very different both in terms of messaging and channel.

Observation

Temptation is the enemy of intention.

A majority of those embarking on Veganuary were omnivores, making it no surprise that over half of those who pledged to drop meat failed well before the month was over.

Despite feeling good about their honourable intentions, meat lovers’ virtuosity was tempered by the smell of what they craved, and nobody - in the history of the world - has ever craved a carrot. Not only were these real temptations throwing a spanner in the works, they made the whole ordeal of going vegan for January uncomfortable. 

Looking at the category, other brands with Veganuary comms were leaning into intention and virtue, framing the exercise as somewhat of a duty people had. In essence, they positioned going vegan for January as the right thing to do.

And while it might be the right thing to do, it’s not easy for omnivores to scrap meat from their diet and no one was recognising their struggle with meaty temptations.

Revelation 

To beat the meat, you need to be naughtier than fast food.

Knowing over half of Veganuaryists fail, it was clear their naughty temptations were getting the better of them.

After just a couple of weeks of doing the right thing, they’d catch a whiff of a kebab or chicken shop and let their naughty side come out. They’d cave.

Omnivores were battling against the unstoppable tide of meaty moments as they walked through the streets or explored delivery menus on their phones.

If we wanted to change behaviours, it was in these moments we needed to help, and leaning into duty wasn’t going to stop their meaty relapses. In fact, we observed that going hard on duty only added pressure and actually increased the chances of relapse.

The more you talk about being and doing good, the more you want to be bad, so we needed to be naughtier than the naughtiest option if we actually wanted to help omnivores in a way that would get THIS™ recognised.

The Strategy

Position THIS™ as the temptation during Veganuary to resolve the honourable struggle of omnivores.

To write a successful strategy, we needed to find the sweet spot between what THIS™ offered and what their omnivorous Veganuary-practicing audience felt. 

THIS™ are all about doing vegan differently. They are the antithesis to worthy plant-based brands, considering themselves as part entertainment platform and part tasty food (that happens to be vegan). Also, given their size, they were keen to draw organic attention by tapping into culture and leveraging real insights, rather than relying on big media spends to outshout their competitors.

This challenger attitude gave us the perfect opportunity to do something that would stand out, confront the boring vegan category cliches and genuinely support omnivores. 

With our understanding of the struggles our audience faced during the month, we decided to position THIS™ as the temptation during Veganuary. We weren’t going to tell people to do the right thing, we were going to recognise their meaty temptations and position THIS™ amongst them.

So we did what no other plant-based brand was doing and entered THIS™ into the fast food playground physically with tactical OOH, leading with entertainment as the antidote to relapses.

The Idea

The Veganuary Helpline 

Time for a guerilla-style campaign that brought some THIS™ themed entertainment into the moments our audience struggled with most - walking or scrolling past naughty, tasty meateries. 

We created a helpline for omnivores tempted by meat during Veganuary that was manned by out-of-work comedians who, when called, would make animal noises or share meat based puns.

Posters with the helpline number were tactically placed on phone boxes outside chicken shops and kebabys so we, with a modest media spend, were exactly where our audience needed us most.

Knowing we had to out-naughty the naughtiest foods, we also drove a billboard van with the number on all around London, parking outside some of the country’s favourite fast food establishments. Cheeky.

Focussing on areas where our audience would crave meat the most, we also bought the top spot on Deliveroo, and working with THIS™'s culinary partners, offered ‘emergency bacon’ to those who had gone onto the app to cheat on their veganuary vows.

The simplicity of this idea allowed us to mitigate the lockdown-driven problem of reduced footfall by creating social and print executions. On social we pushed ads during the times in which people tended to struggle most with their cravings; between 11pm - 2am, Thursday - Saturday. These assets mimicked well-known sources of naughty food and, once clicked, people were taken to a full spread ad that simply asked “Craving this? Call THIS™” along with the helpline number.

How we got this made

As an agile agency with in-house production, we were able to seamlessly join up the process between creative and production. Not only did this allow us to build and launch the campaign quickly, it also afforded us the opportunity to pivot the campaign in real time, taking the idea onto social media as soon as the national lockdown was announced.

Results

• 350 calls per day to the helpline
• Having underestimated the success of the helpline THIS agreed to pay the comedians on a call by call basis. It quickly became apparent that wasn’t the best idea, due to the sheer volume of calls they were receiving. Thankfully they agreed to a day rate instead. 
• 100+ pieces of earned press coverage
• Best performing social posts both organic and paid

CREDITS

Client: THIS™

Agency: Hell Yeah!

Head of Creative: Dulcie Cowling

Creative: George Nixon

Business Lead: Josh Clarricoats

Project Lead: Lola Sauer