Podcast Summary: Müller Rice's Award-Winning Pivot from Persuasion to Avoiding Rejection

Podcast: On Strategy Showcase
Host: Fergus O’Carroll
Guests: Max Keane, Chief Strategy Officer (VCCP London); Matt Hayes, Planning Director (VCCP)
Date: February 1, 2026

Episode Overview

This episode delves into the strategic thinking and creative development behind Müller Rice's recent, award-winning campaign to revitalize its rice pudding brand—particularly among young men in the UK. Fergus O’Carroll is joined by strategic leaders from VCCP London, Max Keane and Matt Hayes, to unpack how a simple, even "absurd," idea—pairing the brand with footballer Declan Rice—resulted in a powerful pivot: moving away from traditional persuasion and instead focusing on avoiding audience rejection and breaking through with cultural relevance.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Background: Category & Brand Challenges

• Small, Stagnant Category: Rice pudding is generally seen as an old-fashioned dessert, primarily consumed by older demographics and facing declining sales.
  • "Largely the category was being kept alive by a much older audience that might remember them back from kind of school days, maybe remembered their grandparents making [it] for them from a bygone era." (Matt Hayes, 05:09)
• Distribution at Risk: Müller Rice was “on the way down” in distribution, threatening its future on shelves.
• Functional, Outdated Advertising: The brand had previously relied on hunger-solution messaging and a mascot ("Tasty Bee") in 6–7-year-old ads, contributing to its outmoded perception.

2. The Client Brief & Strategic Dead End

• Low Priority, High Freedom: With the product in decline, the client was willing to take risks and experiment with strategy—specifically targeting young men, a severely under-indexed audience for the category.

  • "It was a bit of a roll of the dice in the sense that what can we do with this brand? How can we make it worthwhile in the portfolio?" (Matt Hayes, 08:54)

• Failed Traditional Approaches:

  • Attempts to reposition the product as high-protein/gym recovery or tap into nostalgia fell flat in research groups.
  • "Initially we thought: is there a way of trying to tap into something that's slightly more culturally relevant... but it didn't take long... to realize that was going to be a bit of a dead end of a strategy." (Matt Hayes, 11:53)

3. The Research 'Unlock': Embracing Absurdity

• A Powerful Focus Group Moment:
  • When younger respondents recoiled at the product ("It looks like bone marrow!"—[13:32]), the strategists realized the challenge wasn’t persuasion, but overcoming rejection and apathy.
  • "If you're asking yourself what's the emotional benefit of rice pudding, maybe you're asking yourself the wrong question was kind of where we got to." (Max Keane, 16:51)
• Strategic Pivot:
  • Rather than convincing people to love rice pudding, the goal became to avoid rejection and win attention—embracing absurdity and nonsense to break into culturally relevant territory.

4. From Insight to Idea: Declan Rice

• Absurd Connection:
  • The idea to use footballer Declan Rice did not emerge solely from the product’s name, but from the strategic decision to “embrace absurdity” and tap into pop culture.
  • "The strategy was about embracing absurdity to find a way to win our audience's attention." (Matt Hayes, 19:43)
• Serendipity of Timing:
  • Declan Rice was gaining increased prominence in English football as fans organically began singing "Rice, Rice, Baby"—a twist on Vanilla Ice’s hit—at matches.
  • "We stumbled across this whole kind of phenomenon that was happening with fans trying Rice, Rice, Baby. And that suddenly felt like a real ticket into the audience's attention." (Matt Hayes, 23:24)

5. Internal Buy-in: Selling an Absurd Idea

• Flipping Planning Norms:
  • Max Keane encouraged breaking convention: "Planning needs to get to weird shit. That is one of the key functions I think planning doesn't do enough of—like finding the weird bits and working out how to make it mainstream." (Max Keane, 25:14)
• Client/Creative Alignment:
  • Strong collaboration and low ego between planners, creatives, and clients enabled the "nonsense" strategy to be embraced at all levels.

6. Creative Execution

• Out of Home:
  • Bold billboards and posters: Declan Rice dancing with rice pudding, riffing visually and sonically on "Rice, Rice, Baby."
  • “He was literally dancing around with pot of pudding, which A, brought out his personality brilliantly, but B, really landed the silliness of the idea.” (Matt Hayes, 35:11)
• TV/Online Films:
  • The main spot "Rice Fever" debuted around the World Cup, depicting "rice fever" sweeping the nation, with visual gags, TikTok dances, and a running “Rice, Rice, Baby” soundtrack.
  • “We see people doing a TikTok dance to rice, rice baby... Declan’s actual chauffeur getting a hacked in rice rice baby haircut at the back of his head.” (Matt Hayes, 36:45)

7. Impact: Commercial, Cultural, & Strategic

• Turnaround in Business Metrics:
  • Sales reversed a five-year decline, registering double-digit growth, over £8.5m in incremental revenue, and 7% growth in penetration across the target market.
  • "It went from being... on the brink of being delisted... to 8 and a half million in incremental revenue... Penetration grew by 7%.… double digit growth after being a double digit decline for over five years." (Matt Hayes, 39:07)
• Cultural Breakthrough:
  • The campaign became viral pop culture—fans, football meme accounts, and even David Beckham participated in referencing Declan as “Müller Rice.”
  • “Even David Beckham saying it and referencing it was, was really great.” (Matt Hayes, 40:31)
• Continued Legacy:
  • Partnership ongoing; Declan Rice has developed his own recipe variant for the brand; stadium crowds sing "Rice, Rice, Baby" after matches.

8. Broader Lessons for Strategists

• Value in Being “Silly”:
  • Moving away from planners always being “the smartest person in the room,” sometimes bold, unpretentious, populist solutions are most effective.
  • “Some of the best thing you can do is put yourself out there with the silly solution... That’s often the most impactful thing we can do as planners.” (Matt Hayes, 30:24)
• Questioning Conventional Planning:
  • Strategy should sometimes prioritize "nonsense" and populism over cleverness or deep insight when the product and audience call for it.
  • “If you're not useful, then you're not in service of the work... this is a serious bit of strategy, but it is wrapped up in a humility and slight daftness.” (Max Keane, 42:11)
• Low-Budget / “Uncool” Brands as Opportunity:
  • Creative freedom and risk-taking are often more possible in neglected or minor brands, allowing for category transformation.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Product and Category Challenges

• "Once people have tried it, they consistently buy it and become really loyal to the brand. But getting over that first hurdle was so huge... because people just don't really know what it is."
  — Matt Hayes (06:23)

On the Strategic Pivot

• "If you're asking yourself what's the emotional benefit of rice pudding, maybe you're asking yourself the wrong question."
  — Max Keane (16:51)

• “The strategy was about embracing absurdity to find a way to win our audience's attention.”
  — Matt Hayes (19:43)

On Internal Buy-In and Industry Culture

• "Planning needs to get to weird shit. That is one of the key functions I think planning doesn't do enough of—like finding the weird bits and working out how to make it mainstream."
  — Max Keane (25:14)

• “Too often I think we're performing cleverness as planners... Sometimes the work isn't necessarily the work that you wish that you'd done yourself. That is the most impactful.”
  — Matt Hayes (30:24)

On Creative Execution

• "He was literally dancing around with pot of pudding... really landed the silliness of the idea."
  — Matt Hayes (35:11)

• "It's intentional in terms of he's dancing around slightly daft with this pudding because that's the sort of purity of the strategy brought into execution."
  — Max Keane (36:03)

On Results & Impact

• “It went from being... on the brink of being delisted... to 8 and a half million in incremental revenue... double digit growth after being a double digit decline for over five years.”
  — Matt Hayes (39:07)

• “David Beckham... goes up to Declan Rice, he introduces him as Müller Rice to the camera… even David Beckham saying it… was really great."
  — Matt Hayes (40:31)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [04:00–06:35] – Overview of Müller Rice, category challenges, and consumer perceptions
• [08:15–10:20] – Discussion of the client brief and brand’s starting point
• [11:53–15:48] – Strategic dead ends and key qualitative insight from focus groups
• [17:00–19:43] – Strategic pivot: from persuasion to attention-grabbing absurdity
• [19:43–24:11] – Connecting to culture: Declan Rice, "Rice Rice Baby," and serendipity
• [25:08–28:01] – Internal challenges, planning culture, and creative buy-in
• [35:11–37:55] – Creative rollout: OOH, TV, films, and maintaining intentional absurdity
• [39:07–41:58] – Impact: brand turnaround, cultural resonance, ongoing partnership
• [42:11–43:21] – Broader lessons for strategists and reflections on low-budget opportunities

Final Takeaway

This campaign’s genius lay not in clever persuasion or emotional ladders, but in fully embracing the “absurd”—leveraging cultural moments and populist humor to break a dormant category wide open. The Müller Rice and Declan Rice collaboration provides a powerful lesson: sometimes, the bravest strategic move is to abandon overthinking and instead win the right to be noticed, even if it means proudly being "a bit daft." It’s a liberating message for strategists everywhere.