How McCain's patient commitment to brand-building paid off

Summary

On Strategy Showcase: How McCain's Patient Commitment to Brand-Building Paid Off

Episode Release Date: November 18, 2024
Host: Fergus O’Carroll
Guests:

• Mark Hodge – Vice President of Marketing, McCain Foods, North Yorkshire, England
• Roisin Mulroney – Planning Director, Adam and Eve DDB, London

---

Introduction

In this compelling episode of On Strategy Showcase, host Fergus O’Carroll delves into McCain Foods' decade-long journey of strategic brand building. Joined by Mark Hodge of McCain Foods and Roisin Mulroney from Adam and Eve DDB, the conversation uncovers the pivotal decisions, challenges, and insights that fueled McCain’s transformation from a primarily functional brand to an emotionally resonant household name in the UK.

Background: McCain’s Market Position and Challenges

Mark Hodge sets the stage by outlining McCain UK's market landscape. As the largest producer and supplier of frozen potato products in the UK, McCain faced intense competition from private labels and discounters like Tesco’s own brands, Lidl, and Aldi. The rise of these competitors post-economic recession led to increased "discretionary thrift," where even financially stable consumers began downgrading their supermarket purchases.

Notable Quote:

Mark Hodge [10:21]: "From a share perspective, McCain's typically always been over 40% from a value sales perspective."

Strategic Shift: Emphasizing Brand Over Product

Recognizing that traditional tactics were insufficient, McCain undertook a significant strategic pivot in 2014. The allocation of their marketing budget was rebalanced from a 30% brand and 70% product split to a 60% brand and 40% product focus. This shift aimed to create a unified brand message that could generate halo effects across McCain's extensive product portfolio, fostering emotional connections rather than just functional benefits.

Notable Quote:

Mark Hodge [22:52]: "The objective was very much to reduce the price elasticity so that the demand or our market volume performance would be less influenced by price changes in the market."

Implementation: Building the Emotional Connection

Roisin Mulroney explains the collaborative effort between McCain and Adam and Eve DDB to redefine McCain's brand narrative. The team identified that existing advertisements were portraying unrealistic, polished British families, which did not resonate with the diverse and evolving family structures highlighted by recent census data.

Key Elements of the Strategy:

• Brand World Creation: Introduced themes of "Really Real" and "The Good Stuff," focusing on authentic portrayals of British families.
• Strategic Platform: Developed the concept of "The Joyful Reality of Family Tea Time," aligning McCain’s products with meaningful family moments.
• Creative Executions: Utilized relatable imagery and straightforward messaging to celebrate diverse family dynamics without over-romanticization.

Notable Quote:

Roisin Mulroney [30:24]: "We added this brand world of really real and then combined it together with... the strategic platform that was the joyful reality of family tea time."

Execution: Iconic Campaign Elements

One of the standout elements of McCain’s campaign was the use of Ricky Tomlinson as the voiceover narrator. His authentic and grounded voice captured the essence of the campaign, resonating deeply with the target audience.

Notable Quote:

Mark Hodge [34:32]: "We heard Ricky over the top of the visuals and everybody just went, yeah, that's it. A brilliant, characterful voice that he brings down to earth."

Creative Examples:

• Out-of-Home Ads: Simple yet powerful imagery accompanied by messages like "Here's to the moms who are two parents in one" and "Here's to the dads," celebrating various family configurations.
• Television Spots: Narratives that highlighted everyday family interactions, emphasizing McCain's role in facilitating joyful meal times.

Results: Long-Term Impact and Success

The campaign initially showed modest results in the first 18 months, with significant increases in sales volume and brand metrics becoming evident only after this period. The patience and long-term commitment to brand building eventually paid off, leading to sustained growth and a stronger emotional connection with consumers.

Key Outcomes:

• Brand Metrics: Ad awareness doubled over nine years, with key brand image statements improving by up to 61% from an initial 20%.
• Sales Performance: Sales began to rise significantly after the 18-month mark, supported by stabilized and increasing brand health indicators.
• Price Elasticity: Reduced sensitivity to price changes, allowing for more stable and profitable sales performance without excessive reliance on promotions.

Notable Quote:

Mark Hodge [40:07]: "If you look at percentage on deal or depth of deal and the discount we were given... we were able to change that quite significantly and invest more behind things that should drive more penetration."

Insights and Conclusions

Mark Hodge and Roisin Mulroney emphasize the importance of understanding price elasticity and its impact on brand strategy. By focusing on long-term brand building and measuring the right metrics, McCain was able to cultivate a loyal customer base willing to maintain purchase behavior despite price fluctuations.

Key Takeaways:

• Patience in Brand Building: Long-term strategies may not yield immediate results but are crucial for sustainable growth.
• Holistic Measurement: Assessing both brand health and business metrics provides a comprehensive understanding of marketing effectiveness.
• Emotional Connection: Authentic and relatable branding fosters deeper consumer loyalty and reduces price sensitivity.

Notable Quote:

Roisin Mulroney [43:35]: "Understanding what you’re measuring as a brand... is really important because when you’re evaluating it, knowing that it’s only accounting for xyz, but there are other factors contributing later."

Conclusion

McCain Foods' transformation underscores the power of a patient, strategic approach to brand building. By prioritizing emotional connections and maintaining consistency over a decade, McCain not only navigated a challenging competitive landscape but also established itself as a beloved brand in British households. This episode serves as an inspiring case study for marketers aiming to balance short-term gains with long-term brand equity.

---

For a deeper dive into the creative campaigns and detailed metrics, visit OnStrategyShowcase.com and explore the episode’s dedicated page.

Transcript

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Welcome to OnStrategy Showcase. I'm Fergus O'Carroll in Chicago. If you are in the Chicagoland area, I want to invite you to the last live show of this year. It's taking place on Thursday, December 5th at the New offices, or at least the building that is going to be the new office of High Dive Advertising, the agency here in Chicago. And they are responsible for some fantastic work for great brands, do a lot of work for Super Bowls and are building an extraordinary agency. They have agreed to host us at the Merchandise Mart and we are going to do something fun because I didn't want to do anything too serious, particularly in December as we wrap up the year and head into the holiday season. So what we've decided to do is we're going to sort of convert some space at the Merchandise Mart into this winter wonderland and we are going to have a celebration of great holiday advertising from around the world, past and present. And we're just going to have a conversation about it. It's our holiday ads special. It's the first time we've done this. I think it's going to be a complete blast. We're going to have some drinks and some holiday cookies and some fun and some music. And at the center of it, we've got four great people that are going to join me to talk about and share some of these great ads. So I kind of this as just a celebration of great creativity at the holiday season. We've got Samantha Seskow is head of strategy at Leo Burnett here in Chicago. We've got Chad Bry is co founder and Chief Creative officer at High Dive Advertising. Andrew Tyndale is SVP Global Partnerships at System One. And Andrew has agreed to fly in from London and share with us the ratings of some of these great ads and what makes them great. And we have Joe Neo, strategy officer at High Dive here in Chicago. So we've got a great bunch of people. We're going to blow this place out. We are going to have a great get together of the planning and creative community here in Chicago. You can get tickets on our website under the live tour [e-mail] It's Thursday, December 5th from 6 to 8pm at the Merchandise March. Yeah, Merchandise Martin. So looking forward to seeing everybody there. Here's a clip from today's episode.

[Mark Hodge]

Back in 2014, one of the first things I did was reset the budget because at that point it was probably more 30% brand, 70% product. And that was a huge shift. And again, that can be quite a challenge because you get the sales team. McCain's got a big portfolio of products and sales guy, when are we going to see the campaign for product X? When are we going to see that for product Y? And again, that was quite a journey to get them to understand we're not. Because the whole premise of brand advertising and building the brand is you create big halo effects that ripple across the entire portfolio and drive uplift across the entire portfolio. Because you're driving an emotional message that sits across the entire portfolio, not just driving a functional benefit of a product. Don't get me wrong.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So you're a branded portfolio rather than a portfolio of brands.

[Mark Hodge]

Correct. I mean we've got product in there. And don't get me wrong, we do still do product advertising. The ready baked jackets would be an example and some of the more premium products that we've launched in recent years have. But it's we do that where we see an incremental opportunity to grow, where perhaps the brand commit isn't here long sufficiently.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So what's really interesting about this, it's an IPA winner in 2024 for long term effectiveness. Now in this conversation it's important that you hear this all the way through because towards the end of this conversation there's a very honest conversation about patience. And as brands make this shift from leaning to brand leaning and they begin to follow the advice of some of the thought leaders in that space, they also have to realize that transitions don't happen overnight. And Mark Hodge is very, very honest about the first 18 months of this campaign. This ended up being a 10 year long initiative. But the first 18 months did not show the sort of increases in sales that one might think is promised by this transition to more leaning towards more brand than performance. But it is after that 18 month period that the sales values began to increase significantly. So in that early stage they were seeing great signals in terms of brand factor increases, consideration, awareness, et cetera. But it was that patience that allowed this company to really reap the rewards of this. Now in many cases many of us would feel, and I bring it up in this, and they would recognize it. Too many companies would abandon after the first six months or the first year of the first 18, they wouldn't have had the patience to keep going and to have the belief in it. But working with Adam and Eve ddb, which is the home of Lesbinette, and working with the principals of Ehrenberg Bass, they were able to have cultural buy in in the promise of this and it paid off. Significantly. So I think it's really important to listen to that last part of the interview when we about that. This is also, as I mentioned, a 10 year campaign. The brand originally had really just been known as a manufacturer of frozen chips or French fries in our case. And it was this evolution in terms of a brand platform that they described as the joyful reality of family dinner time, or as it's referred to in the UK as tea time. They built this campaign that evolved over the years. So this is the value of great brand platforms at the first year of this initiative. And I'm reading through this only because we don't get the chance in the show to play all of the work and we get to play little sections of the work and it's wonderful work, but all of the work will be on our website. But it's broken down into different segments and phases. It was able to flex the platform was able to flex, to react to what was happening in culture in that particular year within the family unit. Obviously part of this was Covid, but there were other things that were the fundamental understanding of what family is and the fundamental understanding of what couples are, modern day couples are. And all of these phases are reflected in the campaign throughout the years. So to see all of that you can go to our website, but you'll definitely get a very good flavor for it as you listen to the work, as we sprinkle it in throughout the, the, the interview. So I just want to make sure I've touched on everything before we get started. I think I have. So this is Mark Hodge, he is vice president of marketing for McCain Foods there in North Yorkshire, England. And it is. Roisin Mulroney is planning director at Adam and Eve DDB in London. This is McCain Foods. Enjoy. So, you know, I read an awful lot of case studies and use that as a way to sort of filter through what might be. And as I read through this case study, it's a recent winner, IPA Award winner this year. And as I read through, I was like nodding and nodding and nodding. But when I got to the creative executions and I look at, I read the headlines and looked at the imagery, that's when it all came to life for me, Marc. I was like, this is really brilliant in tone, in headline, in photo style. It all brought it all perfectly together. A lot of times we get really great strategies and then sort of, ok, we can get great work and okay strategies, but to see examples of where the strategy is even elevated further up with the creative work and really connects is a great Achievement. So first of all, Mark, congratulations on that. And secondly, congratulations on the effectiveness award from the ipa. And this is long term effectiveness. Not just a single year, 10 years. So amazing work. Congratulations on that. Super.

[Mark Hodge]

Thank you very much.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And thank you also, Roisin. And of course, to our great friends at Adam and Eve DDB in London.

[Roisin Mulroney]

Cheers.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, let's start off, Mark. We have a McCain's over here. I don't know if it's a different McCain's, but tell us about what McCain's is in the UK and what is it that you sell?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, so McCann UK, we're the biggest producer and supplier of frozen potato products. The company started in the UK back in the 70s, initially in the food service business and it, it was created by two, three Canadian brothers, the McCain brothers over in Canada and outside of the Canada, the home nation, the UK was the first nation that they decided to set up a plant in outside of Canada. So it was a big step for the family at the time and it's one that they've never looked back. And it started with the famous oven chip that came out in the 80s from a retail and consumer perspective, which I guess changed how we eat chips in the home forever, really. And I think from then the brand has just got stronger, the portfolio has got bigger and you name it, any type of frozen chip or fry or potato product, McCain can do it.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

When you look at who you guys compete against in the uk, are there any brands that come to mind and how, how are they messaged?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, our main competition is private label. So obviously your Tesco brands and they've got different tiers, the, the baseline, the mid tier and the premium within that. So, you know, they try and cover a lot of bases, but from a, you know, a branded perspective, there's a bit, bit of Bird's eye and waffles, you might know, potato waffles and Bessie's in a roast potato. So a Sunday dinner is obviously a very British thing and you know, they've, they've been very strong historically in, in roast potatoes. But, you know, from a, from a share perspective, you know, McCain's typically always been over 40% from a value sales perspective. So certainly private label and supermarket own has always been there. The thing that we're really competing with in terms of, for the, the nation's plate, if you like.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And so for you, is it, is it. Are we, are we looking at the predominant, the predominant product sales for McCain in the UK is chips or is it split across roast potatoes? Chips, jacket potatoes, other.

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, Most of our sales come through what I would call chips, which is obviously very British, thicker cut than you would get in other markets in Europe and North America. And then the other big product we've got in the portfolio, second biggest, would be our crispy French fries. The best way I can describe those, it's like a Mac Fry McDonald's. You get a McDonald's that we make that people can experience a similar product in the home. And then our third biggest product would be the ready baked jacket potatoes. And the number one, which is featured in a lot of the creative execution that you see in the campaign, is the nation's favorite home chips, which is being with us for a long time and continues to be the number one and most loved product in the UK market.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Roisin, tell us about, as we mentioned earlier, this is a case that goes across 10 years. Tell us about the dynamics when this all started. What were the challenges in 2014 and how did the brand get to that challenge?

[Roisin Mulroney]

I think as kind of Mark's talk to a little bit like the main competitors for this brand are own label. And ultimately at that time there was like a massive surge in people buying own label and the rise of discounters. So over here we've got kind of Lidl and Aldi who were just growing exponentially and all of that is kind of rising and happening after the post economic crash. And Harvard Business Review has kind of uncovered this trend at the time, which was that discretionary thrift was happening. And what that was telling us, and we were learning from it, was ultimately that even people who weren't finding their wallets squeezed as much as, as, as much as as it might be, were downshifting in terms of the, the products that they were buying, especially when it came to their supermarket shopping. And that was, that was a really big worry for a brand like McCain where ultimately you're paying a premium like you do with all brands for a chip product. And yeah, so those two things, the rise of own label, the rise of discounters, and the disproportionate number of people that were being impacted regardless of whether or not they could afford more, was a big problem for us too and for the team at the time to work out and come up with a.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Plan for and the products that were coming out own label, private label, whichever label you used to it, I mean they were becoming much better marketers. And so they were able to package their package, their packaging became better, the product quality became better, they were becoming product brands, not just, you know, not just sort of Grocery store brands, right?

[Roisin Mulroney]

Yeah, that's absolutely true. And also there was, there was, there was more data that was found. And we call this out in the paper for anyone who reads it, where you can see that actually consumers were increasingly having kind of emotional affinity with own label brands, whereas previously and historically they'd just been kind of like, oh, yeah, fine, well, if you, if you can't afford, then you get that. And it was seen as like a slightly negative thing that you might hide. Whereas actually it was becoming a point of pride in some situations as well.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

You've been at this brand. I saw it earlier. I think it's 19 years you've been with McCain, so you've been along this entire journey, which is very cool and very unusual. Tell us about what you were thinking at that point. You're coming out of a major recession and you're, you're looking at tougher economic times. You're looking at this rise of discretionary thrift, as Roisin just said. So what do you, what are you thinking you need to do at that point? And then what did you ultimately decide you had to do at that first point?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, I think, I think it was tough because I think coming out of that recession at that point, it was, you know, the discretionary thrift, it was effective. A lot of brand, and a lot of brands were losing share in their individual categories. I think, you know, private label, you're right, they've done a very good job with their quality and in effect, they commoditize the category. And I think, yeah, you know, and, you know, their products are pretty good. And, you know, I think what we had to realize and look in the mirror a little bit and think, well, actually the tactics we'd use for many years, which had been successful, weren't working and wouldn't work. And actually, you know, when you really started to look in the mirror a little bit and about the brand and its relationship with consumers, it become very, very shallow, I would say, and very functional. So McCain was a manufacturer of frozen food, essentially. It wasn't much more that it was trusted. It was well known. But did it really stand for anything, anything more than that as a, a symbol of trust? Did it really connect with people emotionally like other brands and other categories have done? That probably stood the test of that recessionary better than I think it. It was quite a time of revelation, I think when you sort of say, oh, actually this brand, the business is strong, but actually the brand probably isn't as strong as we think it is. And actually, if we want the brand to be strong in the future. If we want to un. Commoditize the category and elevate McCain above that, then we need a different approach.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, Roisin, at the center of this case is this sort of concept of price elasticity. Tell us, for those not familiar with it, tell us what it is and how it can be influenced.

[Roisin Mulroney]

Fundamentally, I think the way, a helpful way to think about it is it's price sensitivity and it's a measure of how sensitive people are to a product's price. So if you increase that price by 10%, how much will your business take a hit in terms of the sales volume? And a really good example I, I find to get, get my head around it really is this kind of sense of inelastic and being a positive thing. So that means that if you change your price then people will still buy it and petrol being quite a good example of that. So if you imagine it's an essential product and the more essential a product is we put the price up, everyone complains, we're all upset about it, we try to use it a bit less, but fundamentally we need it, so we carry on buying it.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And the unfortunate part of that is that all of the petrol or gas stations are watching each other and they all raise it at the same level. There isn't a competitive market, there's just.

[Roisin Mulroney]

Exactly.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Everybody follows everybody else. So it's, it's. But yes, you're right, nobody's going to stop or start. Most people are not going to buy less gas unless it goes up significantly.

[Roisin Mulroney]

No, exactly. And so that will be a relatively inelastic kind of a product, for example, whereas actually quite a lot of branded products and, and FMCG products are a lot more sensitive, they're a lot more elastic, they're a lot more sensitive to price changes and there's a lot of power in looking at your price elasticity and, and investing in making your price more kind of inelastic. So, so you're able to, to maintain your volumes, even if you do have to put your prices up a little bit, which occasionally you do, and that doesn to be from kind of just trying to increase profit perspective. But lots of businesses, for all sorts of reasons, whether it's inflation or increases in their costs themselves, or have to at different points put their prices up. So it's a really powerful and important thing to be able to know about really.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So you're at the home of Les Bonnet. So Adam and Eve dbd, Adam and Eve DDB is we're less Than at is located. And he's been on the show.

[Roisin Mulroney]

He resides.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yes, he resides. He has his cave. His cave is there. And he has been on the show. He was on about maybe a couple of months back. And he did point to the fact that we are not measuring probably the single most important factor that advertising and marketing can deliver upon, which is maintaining, which is price elasticity, price premium. He's in essence saying that you can increase volumes. If you judge success on volume alone, then you are missing the fact that you may have that. That's not the ultimate value of advertising. It may be, how profitable are those sales? Not the quantity of sales, but the profit of those sales.

[Roisin Mulroney]

Right, exactly. And I think that the tricky thing is when you're kind of looking at any kind of evaluation of marketing and effectiveness, we can get trapped down the slippery slope of becoming more and more insignificant and measuring not the important things. And so if, if we, as, as Les rightly points out, like, if you're only looking at volume, that's only part of the picture. If you're, if you're unaware of the other factors that are happening or where your brand is tracking on other important things, then you don't actually know how profitable you are. And you could be pushing volume. But like, have you been heavily discounting, in which case actually are you less profitable than you were initially? And, and where does that actually set you? And what's that trajectory? And what's that relationship that you're consumers. Consumers. And what's their relationship with your price? So that full picture is really important. And price elasticity is mostly unmeasured by brands.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, that's. Which is sort of bizarre, Mark, that it's. Everybody aspires to maintain or create a premium dynamic, premium price dynamic, but it's not, it's. It's not tracked. Had you guys been tracking it or did you learn of new ways in order to do that?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, I mean, we probably started tracker just before the start of this work. I mean, I think it's. My perspective would be, I think a lot of brand owners, there's a lack of understanding of the economics of how brands grow and how they make money. And I think that can lead to the incorrect actions in the marketplace and tactics. And I think what we started doing when we measured the price elasticity is, you know, we used it to try and help predict where our volume would go, you know, back in times of inflation when there was, you know, electricity inflation, raw material inflation, to try and help manage the business. And I think, I think as, as we got more. As it was more understood within the business, I think it becomes a core metric in terms of brand health. You know, I think it's. And how loyal people are to your brand, the extent to which they will buy it regardless of price. And I think that's. As a marketeer, that's where you want to be, don't you? You want to be. You want, you don't want to be substitutable, easy. You want to create a real connection that consumers value, that they're prepared to pay for and often prepared to pay a higher price for. And I think price elasticity is a real strong metric to help you understand that. And I think it's been very much at the bedrock of the McCain commercial strategy over the last 10 years, for sure.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So last question on this mark would be, was your goal at the time to maintain a price premium or to increase your price premium by using this sort of a measure and these types of this sort of marketing activity that we're going to talk about this campaign over the years?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, the objective was very much to reduce the price elasticity so that the demand or our market volume performance would be less influenced by price changes in the market so that we had a more stable, robust business that wasn't reliant on doing lots of promotions and deep promotions with the customer.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So basically, my understanding, as we move on here to talk about where you went with this campaign, there was a major marketing decision, actually a major business decision that was incredibly ballsy and I got to imagine, incredibly difficult to get to. Was your idea of focusing on building the brand over years versus measuring the brand based upon quarters in terms of sales? How did you get to that and was that tough to get to?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, it was tough. I was at the time when things at best flatlined. In many cases, there was some of the indicators were going backwards. I think it was a time of reflection, regrouping. And I think at the time I remember working with the team and our agency partners and really I asked the question, okay, you know, can we really, you know, codify or write down the rules of how brands grow? And obviously there's a famous book by Baron Sharp with some key principles in that.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And that's. And that's for the listeners who don't know, that's How Brands Grow by Gurn Berg Bass and Byron Sharp, Baron Sharp.

[Mark Hodge]

And I think, you know, we looked at that as a client and agency network and then looked at that and actually run McCain data and category data, you know, and hey, guess what it followed the same patterns and Lesbinette was.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Part of that conversation and probably met.

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, he was probably. Yeah. I remember Les coming up and presenting to the GB leadership team about it as well. And also we had to the Byron Sharp thinking there. So it was a bit of a joint effort and I think but it's, you bring those two bodies of work together and I think it's a really powerful narrative. I think too often I would say, you know, it's, it's ignored by brands and brand owners. It's yeah, it's true and proven category and brand over and over again. Yet, you know, you see brands and businesses ignoring it and doing the opposite time after time again. And it's, you know, so I think for me it was a period of education that, you know, we had to keep going back and keep doing it and, and you know, you look back at the McCain data where we, we'd invest a lot of money in media and advertising and it had not really moved any of the key metrics, whether that's elasticity or whether it's the softer measures of brand health and consideration and all those type of things. You start to question well, why is that? And therefore as a marketing team, what we used to do is very much pin everything we were doing from that month forward against, against these principles of growth.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

We'll be right back. I'd like to share a report I recently read from Tracksuit and TikTok. The report proves what marketers have known for decades that performance and brand marketing achieve better business outcomes together. The report is titled the Awareness Advantage and it backs up a long held theory that having a stronger brand helps your performance marketing perform better. Specifically, high brand awareness advertisers drive two point times more lower funnel conversions than lower awareness advertisers. What's more, if your brand is known by 4 out of 10 consumers, your performance marketing is 43% more effective. It's yet more evidence from Tracksuit to support the value of brand building and is a great resource for marketers trying to nail that tricky balance between performance and brand to get the most out of their advertising activity. You can download the Tracksuit and TikTok report. It's titled Awareness Advantage and you can download it for [e-mail] AwarenessAdvantage that's gotracksuit.com AwarenessAdvantage and if you need a way to measure your brand health, such as your awareness, then Tracksuit is a beautiful, affordable and always on tool that tracks these fundamental metrics over time so you can prove the impact of marketing to business stakeholders.

[James Herman]

Hi there. My name's James Herman and I'm what's known as a distinctive asset, which is something that makes people think immediately of a certain brand. Like the Golden Arches make people think of McDonald's or the swoosh makes people think of Nike. When the most effective marketing and advertising people hear me, they think of the Master of Advertising Effectiveness brand. The Master of Advertising Effectiveness is a six week online program in partnership with Walk where I'll give you a next level understanding of how to make advertising that creates consistently better commercial results. One important ingredient is distinctive assets like me. And me. Being here on this ad is one of the many reasons this campaign is the most effective advertising campaign in the world. Confused? You won't be when you become a Master of Advertising effectiveness. Get started at Mae Academy. That's Mae Academy.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Now back to the show. What were you able to do in, let's say year one and year two as you were onboarding this culturally, did you find that you weren't obviously I assume you weren't able to do everything that you wanted in year one. There had to be maybe some baby steps. What were you able to do in those first few years that then allowed you to get a longer term cultural buy in?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, so I think initially it was just you're getting people on board and people different people in the organization came and onto it more quickly than others. Some people generally had an interest in it and wanted to learn more and understand more. But I think in practical terms there was the initial thing I would say was to really look at the activity we were doing and looking at was it really driving penetration or not? And that goes down to customers and the type of promotions we're doing. How frequently the activity we're doing is that really geared at trying to get more people to buy McCain. So and that resulted is in stopping doing certain things and putting more investment behind other things that should drive them more, more penetration. It also made us question about some of the creative that we're putting out there and actually was it just way too functional now it's not easy to move into a emotional space very quickly. I mean obviously at the time I think that's that triggered a pitch obviously which obviously Adam and Eve were successful in this opportunity.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Tees up and planning, gets involved in trying to figure out, well, what do we do in order to get to that place that Mark refers to where it's a little more of an emotional connection. Talk us through that. What did you guys do in order to discover the territory that you ultimately discovered.

[Roisin Mulroney]

The first thing was that mums and dads at the time, back in 2014 didn't really relate to ads portraying families. And that's British families for the most part. It was showing polished, really very white, really very middle class, really very kind of unattainable ideals of family meal times in particular and being particularly unrealistic and people just saying that they've just kind of switched off to it. It wasn't really particularly engaging for them. It wasn't actually aspirational because it was so unattain attainable. And that was really meant advertising really wasn't working very hard. When you contrast that with the fact that in the 2011 census you kind of found that 20% of British kids were growing up in. In single parent households. You know, 20% of households have got people living with disability and a massive increase in same sex parents as well. It would have. Advertising just really wasn't doing families justice at all. And when we kind of uncovered that and the team that were working on it at the time, and I have to say team, because this is absolutely a kind of planning batten pass over time exercise. So I was not part of this team but the wonderful team came out with this kind of brand world in collaboration with our creative director who actually has been consistent the whole time, Ben Tollet. Like a really real was the way that they described it and fundamentally that was just actually showing British families as they were. So we added kind of this brand world of really real and then combined it together with. Actually it's not just really real, it's the good stuff. And like by the good stuff we then got to this strategic platform that was the joyful reality of family tea time. I think that's really important because it's joyful, it really is the upside, it's the reality. But also family tea time being fundamentally important because let's not forget we're selling chips. So let's exist in the space that we are as a product in that way.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I mentioned earlier that when I looked at the work it was like everything came together for me. Can you describe your favorite piece of the work, Roisin? And I'm going to drop the TV spot in after you explain it. Maybe you can explain the Ricky Tomlinson role, why him? And how you've used him and then we'll drop in the TV spot.

[Roisin Mulroney]

The thing that kind of joins it all together is this Ricky Tomlinson narrative. And it's just like a beautiful ode to working Class British families.

[E]

When it comes to family, what's normal? Normal isn't normal. Just mummy, mum, mama, stay at home, mums, working mums, single mums, adoptive mums, I'm doing this on my own. Mums, nans, grans who put you to bed and tell you not to believe in ghosts. Or maybe it's dad who tucks you up. Dad, Daddy, two daddies, long distance daddies, weekend dads who pick you up and let you stay up late but make you promise to never ever tell your mum. Maybe you never met your dad. Perhaps it's granddad who takes you out for that kick about. Or your brother, your half brother, your brother from another mother. Maybe your friends are your family. The family you got to choose, like a sister from another Mr. Who pops around for tea. Families come in all shapes and sizes, but it's meal times that make a family. McCain, we are family.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So for you, Mark, you. I mean, let me say, for me, for me, everything in this campaign was about the execution. I was. It had to land in the right emotional space and it had to have the right emotional tone. Was that something that you had in your mind also? Was there discussion around that? Was it hard to get there?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, I mean, it was me just touching on the VO that you mentioned was Ricky probably the eighth or ninth voice. I think we put that campaign because we tried lots of different ones and it just didn't seem to work. Didn't seem to capture, you know, the essence of the idea that we're trying to get across. And I think I always remember that moment when we, we heard Ricky over the top of the visuals and everybody just went, yeah, that's it. And I think just brilliant, characterful voice that he brings down to earth, the bit of grit in there.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So just to describe number one for the listener, you've. You've got to go and see the work. So it's all going to be on our [e-mail] on this episode's page. But there was a lot of restraint, Roisin, shown, I think shown by the writers and the creative teams here, because they didn't try to over romanticize anything. I mean, for example, on the out of home, I'm looking at one here where it's a mom in her kitchen and her two sons. The mother is looking to the camera and the sons are just goofing around playing with each other. They're like teenagers. And the headlines just simply, here's to the moms who are two parents in one. There's another one where you can see a young baby looking up at his dad and his dad is standing behind his partner, he's got his hand on his partner's shoulders and it simply says, here's to the dads. So this is a two dad household and so examples of this. Another one is here's to the stay at home moms or mums. The last example would be here's to the aunts who are really just moms mates. So there's a lot of restraint there. That was a writer who said, I'm just gonna, I'm not gonna, I'm just gonna put a little touch on it. And the rest is implied.

[Roisin Mulroney]

I think that's the power and the simplicity of this campaign because it's actually, I think what's quite important is for everyone to remember, like this campaign launched in 2015. And so all of the things that we're talking about where actually brands over the kind of past, however long, have actually done a lot of work around representation and trying to make sure that they are showcasing less represented parts of parts of the tapestry of all different in every country. And I've seen it in the us, I've seen it in the uk, I've seen it in other kind of more developed advertising markets. But when this launched, that wasn't the case. And so actually there was a lot of power in being quite straightforward because people weren't doing it and it was surprising. And actually, if you layered too much into that, you're almost confusing things for people and you're adding multiple messages and you're adding a point of view you didn't really need to. And his too was actually actually a consistent piece of language in this campaign that was supposed to be kind of celebrating, but without kind of too much ceremony, I guess, and making people feel seen. As Mark said, too many people don't feel seen. That's our bad, that's popular culture's bad. So let's make sure they do feel seen. And doing that in a. In an understated, quite simple, straightforward way is actually very powerful. Accompanying the type of imagery that we chose to use as well, which is just incredibly warm when it comes to.

[E]

Family, how much do we really have in common? There's big differences, small differences leave and remain kind of differences. There's talkers, listeners, the you never listen, listen to me is some are proud and some are proud of who they've raised. There's cat lovers, dog people, the mustn't miss a moment kind of people, the screen timers, and the digital detoxers. Maybe you have faith or worship at the temple of rock and roll and you debate your differences over chips and cheeseburgers, or vegan cheeseburgers, which you tuck into at dinner, supper or tea, whatever you call it. There's no better time to come together. After all, it's differences that make a family. McCain, we are family. We've spent a lot of time together lately, but have we really made time for each other? Here's to breaking the routine. Lights dimmed and kids toys away. Fallout over, housework forgotten, work from home, desks turned back into dining tables. Nights in that feel like nights out. And food made with love. Here's to making time for each other. McCain, we are family.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So let's talk about the, the business and brand impact side of things. But what were those business impacts and brand impacts? And I'm really curious about when you started to see the positive impacts and was it all about improvement year over year or were there dips and peaks and valleys as you sort of look out over the 10 year period in terms of what worked, what didn't work?

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah, I think the first thing to say, and it goes back to the whole thing of managing brands over years and not quote is the, the, there's a chart in the, in the case study you'll see is actually if you put a line in after 18 months, two years, not a lot had moved and. But then when you see it just exponentially grows from that point onwards.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

But was that terrifying to see that? Did that sort of make everybody sort of think, oh shit, I think it.

[Mark Hodge]

Did a bit because I think, you know, I think again this comes back to the education of people, people in the past being trained to look for short term improvements. And actually I think the difference on this occasion, I think when you get, when you take people on a journey of the idea and what you're trying to achieve in a bigger vision and I think when they can connect with it personally. And also I think even though some of the metrics maybe weren't moving in those first 18 months, I think just the response from the general public around the campaign and the positivity we were getting, you just felt that there was something there that we needed to be patient and give it a chance to really connect and really embed before we got bored with it and decided to move on to something else.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Because then in retrospect though, do you think that was an issue of spend level? Do you think it was an issue of message? Why do you think it wasn't working because most, most marketers will not be as enlightened or as patient as you guys. So most, most people would be like, okay, you were wrong. Now let's go, let's do something else. You guys stuck with it. Did you do a little analysis on why it maybe didn't work? Either one of you guys have a sense of it?

[Mark Hodge]

Well, I think for me it was working. Just the shifts were very small and obviously businesses expect bigger shifts on some metrics. So we were, we were seeing some very early green shoots. I think it was just being patient to let them flourish and nurture those green shoots into something bigger. Because I think the signs were certainly there. I think certainly you could say at the very worst, the work had stopped. The arresting of the declines and what we're seeing in terms of the, the negative in terms of downs and revenues and profits and we'd started to stabilize things and things were starting to just be on an uptake. So again, it's, yeah, it was a bit of a, you know, I'm very lucky that and a lot of other businesses. You probably would have killed this campaign after 18 months.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, for sure. And then, so when you began to see things rise, what was causing that? Do you know? Were you able to get an understanding of why it suddenly started to turn? It wasn't, was it?

[Mark Hodge]

No. I mean, way before that we'd seen things increase, meaning Covid accept, you know, help things accelerate in many respects. But we'd seen a significant climb on a lot of the brand metrics way before then. About the extent to which McCain understands modern family life, I think it's just, you know, I always think it, it takes, you can't change people's attitudes overnight and obviously attitudes then instruct behavior and, and those things take a long time to change.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Anything you'd add to that.

[Roisin Mulroney]

I think it comes down to what you're measuring as a brand. And I think that a lot of brands struggle by not measuring some of the longer term aspects or sometimes maybe not fully understanding their own econometric analysis. Just because you have econometric analysis doesn't mean that it has all of the long term effects of the advertising baked into that. They have varying degrees. None are bulletproof. Everything is just equations and different people add different things into different equations. And understanding what yours as a marketer includes and doesn't include is really important because when you're evaluating it, knowing that it's only accounting for xyz, but you know that there are also, there's also evidence that like There's, I don't know, H over here that could also be contributing and coming later. You just need to be armed with that information so that you can have those conversations with stakeholders who are in charge of budgets and things like that. And so you can understand yourself if you've kind of exploited all of the possible avenues of a campaign and it is time to change because sometimes a campaign might not be working, but in this instance, and I really would urge anyone who is listening to have a look at the paper and scan the charts because you can see year by year and all the different variables that were changed. But like over time we had lots of positive indicators and obviously big brands also if you are a market leader, you are less likely to see massive upshifts very quickly. But we had ad awareness doubling over nine years. Key brand image statements improving significantly and shifting within a couple of years even or 18 months and nudging upwards. And this is a completely new positioning for the brand. So that is important. And there is evidence that shows that it does take years for, for new, entirely new positions to bed in. And we had consideration and purchase intent increasing. We had value for money perceptions improving, which was really powerful. And there were some Covid upticks but that dropped back down again and we actually maintained to a level that other businesses haven't been able to. And that was really positive. And the business also made smart investment decisions with media during COVID as well.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Mark, what about sales going to be going at the bottom line? The brand metrics are great and I think it's a great thing to be having this conversation and saying that those first 18 months where we saw all of the returns on both brand metrics and business metrics, I think it's important for people to realize that because the impression that might be out there because so many people are talking about brand versus promotion that we might be setting up the expectation that this is an overnight change of activity. It's not, it's. It's called long term for a reason. It has a short term impact but the real benefits are longer term. Mark. And so I'm just wondering when you saw that first 18 months and then you saw sales beginning to increase or you saw just the brand metrics beginning to increase. Just trying to get something concrete there.

[Mark Hodge]

I would say it was a bit of both. So I think what we were able to do from a sales perspective is we were able to. When you look back at the, when you look at percentage on deal or depth of deal and the discount we were given on some of the Bosch activity, we were able to change that quite significantly from where we've been and obviously that was important. And I think the consideration the brand started to increase. We started to see people search for the McCain seen, not just oven chips. So again, people were searching for the brand, not just the category or the product. And I think even some of those softer measures about your McCain understanding modern British family life was. It was a, I think it gone up from something like over the period of the campaign, I think reached a peak of about 61%. I think for something like that from or from about 20. And I think some of these things, things when I look back, some of those were previous campaigns in the early noughties was, you know, you'd look at tracking and things hardly ever moved right. You know, when you start to see these things moving 10, 20, 30, 40% over a five year period, then you know, it is like a snowball and a cumulative effect and it just, it builds its own momentum.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

My last question is it's like how did you sort of learn that you needed to balance brand with promotional spend? Because that's a big thing people struggle with. You were on this committed journey. You had a, you had cultural buy in you. Obviously, you know, we all hear about the, well last talks about the 60, 40 split, 60% brand, 40% promotion. Did you figure out what that ratio was for you and your category? Agree.

[Mark Hodge]

Yeah. I mean, and it wasn't just our category. We followed that 60, 40 split. So back in 2014, one of the first things I did was reset the budget because at that point it was probably more 30% brand, 70% product. And that was a huge shift. And again that can be quite a challenge because you get the sales team. McCain's got a big portfolio of products and sales guys. Well, when are we going to see the campaign for product X? When are we going to see that for product Y? And it's again that that was quite a journey to, to get them to understand we're not. Because the whole premise of brand advertising and building the brand is you create big halo effects that, you know, ripple across the entire portfolio and drive uplift across the entire portfolio. Because you're driving an emotional message that sits across the entire portfolio, not just driving a functional benefit of a product. Now don't get me wrong.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So you're a branded portfolio rather than a portfolio of brands.

[Mark Hodge]

Correct. I mean we've got product in there. And don't be wrong, we do still do product advertising. The ready baked jackets would be an example and some of the more premium products that we've launched in recent years have. But it's we do that where we see an incremental opportunity to grow, where perhaps the brand isn't here only sufficiently. But that's very much in the 40%, not in the 60. We will monitor on a regular basis in terms of how we're investing the money between brand and product.

[Roisin Mulroney]

I would just add, I think in terms of setting out that strategy to start with and making sure they had buy in. Something that's always been really powerful is the investment in the econometrics and the econometric analysis and what that econometric analysis has enabled for McCain. And you don't always see it like as a planner on an agency, I have the privilege of seeing how different companies measure lots of things. And not everyone chooses to invest as McCain do in seeing the impact and they have, they're able to have a look at what is the halo impact on sales of different products, of brand, of certain campaigns and brand campaigns. And that obviously does help with the conversations around when are we going to see the payback around this? Because you're able to then talk to. Well, actually we're working at this, this level and this analysis is demonstrating that this uplift in sales is actually as a result of this brand campaign. And that, that is really helpful. And so the combination of measuring things over a long time, measuring the right things and the most significant things and making sure that everyone is on board together is, is how Mark and the team have done such an incredible job over this incredibly long, committed time period, which is so rare to see.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

It is a fantastic case. Everybody be sure to go to our website and you can see all of the creative work. It's Mark Hodges, VP Marketing at McCain Food Foods in North Yorkshire, England. And Roisin, what a wonderful name. Roisin Mulroney is planning director at Adam and Eve DDB in London. Congratulations to you both and most importantly, thank you for, for giving us the time to hear your great story. Thank you, thank you, thank you. And we will see everyone on the next episode.