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Uncensored CMO
Oreo’s playful positioning, bold innovation and brand partnerships - Eugenia Zalis
00:47:10
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Transcript148 lines
- [00:00]
Eugenie Azales
Foreign.
- [00:06]
John Evans
Ladies, gentlemen, welcome back to the Unsensor cmo. Now in this episode, we're going to be talking about the fastest growing sweet snack brand in the US Oreo, a global success story that dates back an amazing 110 years. Now I'm joined this episode by their global CMO, Eugenie Azales, to talk about the secret to their success, what they've been doing on the super bowl, how do they approach product innovation, they and how they get their brand into culture. It's a fascinating conversation, loads of fun and I know you're gonna enjoy it. Here it is. Eugenie Azales, welcome to the show.
- [00:36]
Eugenie Azales
Thank you. Thanks, John. Thanks for having me. Very happy to be here today.
- [00:39]
John Evans
Great. Well, this is a bit of fun, isn't it, because we get to talk about Oreo and of course you're on a mission to stay playful, which is a lot of fun. But before we get into Oreo, I'd love to find out how your journey in marketing started.
- [00:50]
Eugenie Azales
So, I mean, I really got into marketing. I think it was just, just the power of, you know, the brands and the ability to impact so many people. And that's why I love marketing and I love CPG. I joined Unilever 20 years ago and that was the highlight of my career. So, yeah, it was really, you know, one for the books, to be part of the team that worked on Campaign for Real Beauty and saw the transformation of a brand into, you know, the icon that it is today. So that was, you know, chapter number one, I guess, in Unilever, which was, you know, 20 years of, you know, lots of growth and fun.
- [01:26]
John Evans
Now Unilever is like one of those iconic organizations, brand led, very, very marketing led, you know, famous for brand building. What can we learn from how they approach marketing that you think, you know, people could benefit from hearing so much.
- [01:40]
Eugenie Azales
I've learned, I think, you know, I always say I've learned the fundamentals. You know, that was my marketing school. So one of the key things that seem, you know, quite, quite basic, but I think sometimes we forget, especially with all of the data driven measure results, is that at the heart of it, this is about people and it's about understanding consumer needs and doing it in a way that feels very human. So I think a lot of the fundamentals about consumer centricity and the power of big ideas that have ability to disrupt and to touch people's hearts are at the heart of our industry. And that's something I've learned and stays very close to me.
- [02:27]
John Evans
Now you casually mentioned in the Introduction. You worked on Dove and probably one of the most biggest case studies in the kind of power of positioning and marketing and so on. What were the kind of significant points in the journey that kind of turned Dove into the brand that it is today?
- [02:42]
Eugenie Azales
I think it was clearly a journey, but there was something very powerful in seeing the Dove transformation and the power of people in leadership roles to really make that happen. So when you think about stereotypical beauty and what was going on around the beauty industry, it kind of became obvious after DAV did it, and it was there, but it was bubbling in the surface. And I think it just took a very strong, powerful leadership at that time on the brand to really seize that opportunity and making it happen. So it's quite an inspiring case, I think, for marketeers around the world on the power that we have to really use the brands for good and to deliver against consumer needs. So very powerful leadership story, I think, above everything else.
- [03:40]
John Evans
And which bits were you most proud of working on yourself?
- [03:43]
Eugenie Azales
I mean, what bits? There was so much. It was a turmoil, and I actually started working on the deodorants business. Through that transformation, they moved on to the hair business. Probably one of the more like, intellectually challenging thing at that point was once we had the power of the idea about, you know, real beauty, real care, real women, was how to turn that from just something like an idea that people buy into to products that people want to buy. So how to make sure that you connect the dots of a powerful idea to, you know, selling shampoo and conditioner and deodorants around the world. So really that, you know, that linkage, that real product linkage of understanding how that. What that does means in different categories. So that was. That was a proud moment.
- [04:35]
John Evans
I think people often underestimate the power of ideas, don't they, in terms of how it can affect an organization. I was working on an energy drink in the UK called Lucozade, and we ended up with. We were actually going. I think we had like five years of decline, and we were trying to turn it around. And we came up with this idea called Made to Move, which is basically that, you know, as human beings, we're designed to move and exercise and, you know, stay fit. And we realized our purpose actually was to help people move. And the moment we came up with that, you know, we're all made to move idea, suddenly, it suddenly impacts everything. The partnerships we do, we presented our customers, the way we engaged our employees, it was really quite profound. That a simple idea, once it clicks and it's like based on a good consumer truth and it's true to the brand. It's amazing how far it takes you.
- [05:19]
Eugenie Azales
Exactly. I love what you're saying. And I think to me that's a bit of the power of Dove. That's the power of Oreo and that's the power of all iconic brands. Right. They are anchored on those big ideas, very deeply rooted in human needs and so simple, right?
- [05:35]
John Evans
Tasty.
- [05:36]
Eugenie Azales
So simple. So, yeah, I had the privilege of seeing that case and now the Oreo case very closely. So.
- [05:43]
John Evans
So when did the Oreo opportunity come up for you?
- [05:46]
Eugenie Azales
So, you know, my first chapter was Unilever. My second chapter was a few years of consulting and I spent five, six years here in New York consulting for different companies, doing some fractional CMO roles and really learned how easy it was to transfer ideas and skills and the power of like cross pollinization in a way of like, you know, following the old but twisting with something new and how the power that that had for marketing. And I was in that second chapter of my life when the ORI opportunity came around. That was two years ago and I do think I have the best job in the industry.
- [06:23]
John Evans
I was going to say do a bit of research for this conversation. I'm like, you've had a lot of fun. So inventing products and coming up with great campaign ideas. It does look certainly from the outside like it's a lot of fun. You also, you changed the positioning, didn't you? So Stay Playful is now the kind communication, at least the positioning that you've adopted. How important was that? Because you referenced it on Dove. Real beauty. How important has that been to what you're currently doing?
- [06:47]
Eugenie Azales
Great question. And actually lots of similarities with Dove in the sense that Oreo is also legacy, heritage, brand. More than 110 years we've been around and over its history, it managed to stay relevant, stay strong and stay at the forefront of culture, which is impressive for a brand this old. The evolution, as everyone knows, who doesn't love and know an old Oreo? It was all around like parent, children, relationship, and how the product at the center unlocked those moments of real, intimate, deep, playful connections. And that campaign evolved into the same situation as seen from a mom's perspective. So looking at spouses, neighbors and opening the aperture of those playful moments until our current campaign, which is called Stay Playful. And the interesting journey is how while staying true to who we are, the product truth of being a black and white sandwich cookie that begs to be played with, which is our product truth and it's been the same product truth since the very beginnings. We managed to elevate our campaign from something that was more about capturing a moment in time with the product at its center to elevating the whole brand. And what does playful connections mean for more people, for more space pieces, for more, you know, more collaborations? And we've definitely managed to, like, unleash, unleash the potential of the brand. And there's much more that we have.
- [08:22]
John Evans
It's a good combination of kind of functional benefit and emotional, isn't it? The kind of two things together. As you sort of reminded me of a campaign on a children's drink in the UK called Fruit Shoot, and we end up with a positioning called Go Explore. Because what it. Because the product meant the kids didn't spill the drink. It meant they could go out and take their drink with them and back of the car and, you know, you know, go and playing in the garden and so on. So Go Explore was their imagination, but also the benefit, particularly to mums and dads, that when they had them in the car, they weren't spilling it all over the back seat sort of thing. So I love the kind of, you know, functional emotional benefit combined that.
- [08:57]
Eugenie Azales
That's. I think it's one of the beauty about this brand, how intrinsic the product is to the brand. Right. And their stories. And you would have seen the super bowl campaign from last, which, you know, there's a sequel on air at the moment around a twist on it in the US it's called Trusted Twist in Europe, but it's exactly that. It's evolving. Our ritual of Twist lick dunking, which is just a celebration of how, you know, you eat an Oreo and everyone eats an Oreo differently. I'd love to know how you eat yours. I can definitely tell you how I eat mine. Taking it to embedding it in culture in order to be topical around people making decisions. And the true insight is that there's nothing more boring than making decisions sometimes as adults. Right. So how can we inject a bit of playfulness with the brand and the product at its center?
- [09:50]
John Evans
Well, firstly, we should find out how do you eat yours?
- [09:54]
Eugenie Azales
I don't eat it with my fork. I do eat it with my hands. I definitely twist it. I scrape it so I don't lick it. I use my teeth to scrape the cream, and then I don't dunk.
- [10:07]
John Evans
Is there any data on what people do do, you know, like, the most common, most unusual?
- [10:12]
Eugenie Azales
It depends by market. So some markets, we call them the Dunker market. So markets that are really into uk, UK dunks.
- [10:20]
John Evans
Because we got a tradition of dunking in our coffee and tea.
- [10:23]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, exactly.
- [10:23]
John Evans
That's like how we do biscuits.
- [10:25]
Eugenie Azales
Not that much on milk as much as the us. US is the ultimate, you know, dunker market. China very much so as well. But then there's as many combinations of, you know, ways to eat an Oreo as people on this planet, really. And that's. That's it. Right. I think we were built on the twist lick dunk, which is very much a ritual that we. We embrace. But then as you would see in social, how people, you know, Oreo is a canvas for people to really have fun and connect with a cookie. There's tons of, you know, viral things around, like the Oreo roulette, where you just, you know, throw the Orion depending on where it lands, people dunking in, you know, mustard, you know, all those weird things, but, you know, it's all good by us.
- [11:10]
John Evans
You mentioned in your introduction as well, about the brand being 110 odd years. I had no idea, actually. And presumably where in the world you live influences kind of your perceptions of brand, because in the uk, it's relatively modern. You know, obviously in the us it's very, very old. So how do you manage the brand, when I presume it's in different kind of stages of its life cycle all across the world?
- [11:31]
Eugenie Azales
Exactly. As you said, we manage by. We cluster, we call it brand maturity. So US and China are our two strongholds. Markets where the brand has been around for longer, and then we have different brands that are in the intermediate stage and brands where we've recently launched less than 10 years ago. So we are really everywhere. It's our largest geographical footprint for Mondelez. So it's truly global brand and very iconic. But it's true that the perception of the brand and the development of the brand is quite different. So we try to do lots of, you know, strategy frameworks, all of those boring stuff, but it's ultimately about understanding how to build the brand to its potential depending on where the market is.
- [12:15]
John Evans
Now, I know it's an American term, say playbook.
- [12:18]
Eugenie Azales
Right.
- [12:18]
John Evans
But you literally probably do have a playbook for, you know, Fourier, don't you? Do you have to alter the Playbook depending on where in the world you are and how much of it would be the same thing in the world and how much of it would you change depending on the market?
- [12:29]
Eugenie Azales
Perfect. Yeah. We call it. The document is called the Oreo Playbook.
- [12:32]
John Evans
I was assuming. So if you don't have a playbook that no one else is allowed to. Right.
- [12:36]
Eugenie Azales
It exists and we. It's not one of those documents that sits in the cupboard, but we actually use it and we reinvent it every. Every year. You know, it's. It's a live document and we keep learning from, you know, our lead markets, US and China and the great work that happens there, as well as some of the youngest market, like South Africa, had an amazing campaign last year around how do people eat your Oreo? You know, it's like Oreo your way and really celebration the diversity, celebrating the diversity of the country and how people consume our Oreo. But yeah, that playbook exists and it gets updated. We're quite busy doing that. The beauty of Oreo, I also think it's the clarity on what the brand at its heart is, which we call it like the core components of the brand, like our brand foundations, our brand values, our leaves a very strong visual identity system with one of the strongest DBAs out there, these distinctive brand assets. But at the same time we also have a very clear flex model where many of the insights and communication happens in our markets that are of course, much closer and that allows us to be really embedded in culture. And every market sees Oreo as they are Oreo because it is, I can imagine.
- [13:56]
John Evans
So break down what your distinctive assets are because I think part of the success is because, you know, round and, you know, different. But what are the distinctive assets?
- [14:04]
Eugenie Azales
So we, you know, we've run quite a few studies on distinctive assets. We try to rerun them every few years and broadly speaking, it's our color blue, very distinctive for Oreo. It's our cookie with milk. Right. It's our combination, it's our very, very distinctive wordmark, our Oreo wordmark that has evolved and slightly changed, but has been quite distinctive for a while. And it's also our, you know, it's not part of our DBAs, but we have two very strong brand word, like our tone of voice, our personality and as I said before. Right. Our very, very clear values that drive everything we do.
- [14:40]
John Evans
Yeah, I noticed with the word mark, we've just had the super bowl here and you had a game day pack, didn't you, where you've kind of embossed, you know, footballs into the top of Oreos, which I thought was.
- [14:51]
Eugenie Azales
That's right, very subtle. And that's the other thing about our product that is a canvas for us to live our brand purpose of connecting the world through playfulness, which is we really have a lot of fun with flavors. As everyone knows, we have fun with embossment, and we really bring the playful spirit to our collaborations as well, where we try to surprise and delight our consumers. So the cookie per se allows us to do things like you've just described, or our collaboration with Coca Cola that we did last year that was super fun and made people very happy all around the world.
- [15:26]
John Evans
Just describe that, because that's not a collaboration I'd have expected you to do, but, you know, you're bringing two of the world's most iconic brands together. How did that come about? And how did it kind of come to life as well?
- [15:36]
Eugenie Azales
So how did it come to life? It really came back to my point about, like, people. It came around, you know, people talking to each other and thinking, you know, let's do something together. What could it be? A group of us at Oreo, you know, flew over to Atlanta, we met with the leadership team there, visited the museum, were impressed by, you know, the amazing power of the brand. I think they were equally impressed by Oreo's capacity to, you know, do limited editions flavors and really implement it, you know, exceptionally well in store. So there was a sheer, like, mutual admiration and a willingness to, you know, do something together. And I believe that the brands at their heart had lots of things in common. Both brands are all about people and connections, playfulness and happiness. So we were super confident we will pull something out. And we just used our creative juices and we came up with a collaboration that, as you said, no one was expecting, and it definitely created a lot of fun for consumers.
- [16:40]
John Evans
Last year, it was definitely one of the surprises of last year. I wasn't expecting it, but tell everyone who isn't familiar actually what the collaboration was.
- [16:49]
Eugenie Azales
So the collaboration was at a brand level and at a product level. So we had the concept, the campaign idea was around besties for a limited time only. And the insight was all around understanding our brands, you know, anchored in connection, in happiness, in playfulness, and the need for Gen Z for connection. So really clear with who we were targeting and what was the consumer need. So we became besties. Coke and Ore became besties for a little time. Our teams became besties for a little time. We really did, and we had a blast working on the collaboration. The limited editions were actually a Coke that tasted like Oreo and an Oreo, it's a bit of a tongue twister and an Oreo that tasted like Coke. I encourage you to try the product.
- [17:40]
John Evans
I haven't tried it yet, but I'm fascinated to Try it. I did one years ago actually when I was working on was it Tango? So Tango is in the UK is like Fanta and we did a collaboration with a chocolate bar called Crunchy. It kind of crunchies like honeycomb and chocolate. And so we did Tango flavored Honeycomb. It's absolutely amazing. I mean people went wild for it because it gives you something novel to talk about and extra displays in store and do do things you wouldn't normally do. But yeah, collaborations like that, but you crash two brands together can be quite.
- [18:12]
Eugenie Azales
And I think we did it in a way that was not just about the product, but about the who program and the customer experience end to end. We had this amazing activation with Spotify where you could merge playlists with your besties. So there was a lot of things for people to have fun with. Our Oreo cookie US version had one cookie that was red with a Coca Cola embossment. It had the Coca Cola syrup baked into our cookie. It had pop candy or fizzy effect on the cream. It looked red. So it was really a lot of fun for consumers. And I think everyone went wild.
- [18:49]
John Evans
I can imagine trying it now. You must do a lot of innovation, I'm guessing, you know, it's a big brand, you know, global, lots of different markets. So is there a way that you approach doing innovation? You know, how do you evaluate what a good idea is and what a bad idea is?
- [19:04]
Eugenie Azales
I think it depends on the type of innovation. So I'm not going to bore you with like playbooks or frameworks or strategy, but I think we are very clear on the role of different innovations for the brand. So we don't treat an innovation like cakes, the Oreo cakes, in the same way that we treat the limited edition Oreo, Coca Cola. Right. So we're very clear what innovation, what's the role of each different types of innovation around reaching new consumers or just, you know, giving it up, you know, giving consumers a bit more fun, so increasing, you know, their basket size, reaching new channels. But we definitely do a lot of innovation. I would say the one thing about Oreo is we use our limited editions very smartly to deliver not only collaborations, but fun flavors that are just there, fun. And if you go online, you just see that our consumers go crazy just like trying to guess how are these mad people coming up with flavors, guessing which is the new crazy flavor they're going to come up with and the fact that they're limited, just give them a nice reason to try it, have fun and it protects the health of our core business, which is, you know, of course, significant.
- [20:18]
John Evans
Well, that's really interesting, isn't it? Because, I mean, I think in my career there's always been this swing between must focus on the core and protect the core and innovation seen as being, you know, kind of a bit wasted effort. And then in other parts of my career, innovation's been used to extend the appeal of the brand, access new audiences and occasions, and actually bolsters the core. So how do you get that kind of balance between focusing in on the core Oreo versus the limited editions, for example?
- [20:44]
Eugenie Azales
I think some of the innovations we do, we see them more like a core innovation that necessarily are true as other companies would define innovation, which is opening up a new either sub brand or a new platform and reaching new consumers. Some of our innovation is really close to the core and I think it has the beauty of feeding the core. So it builds the brand equity, it gives you extra displays. It really brings back and fits the, the core of the brand very nicely.
- [21:16]
John Evans
It's funny actually, I. We put a few through the system, one system as well, just for fun to see what came back. And it was quite interesting actually because the top ones were exactly what you just said. They kind of made Oreo even more Oreo. So we had like the. The most Oreo Oreo. My favorite actually was the blackout cake Oreo as well. But that's because I love chocolate, so. But again, it's kind of like playful twists, excuse the pun on the kind of core products, isn't it that they were the ones that, you know, kind of particularly resonated because you're leveraging something people really love.
- [21:47]
Eugenie Azales
Exactly. We have things like what you just said, right? Like the most Oreo Oreo now in the market, the loaded Oreo, which is, you know, a lot of cream in the middle with like crushed up Oreos. We also do a lot of limited editions that are not reliant on a partner. So things like, you know, we did in India, I think it was the first market to do it called like Saed with Oreo. So using the embossments of the Oreo to just like have a little fun. So lots of twists on the core cookie which are the more like closer in, you know, like leading with our brand first. And then we have of course lots of fun flavors as you probably have on your list.
- [22:26]
John Evans
The top one actually was marshmallow, actually Smorio, which I thought was interesting. So kind of marshmallow in the middle which because obviously a lot of people would have you Know, put Oreo over a fire, wouldn't they, to sort of melt it. And so that's interesting because it's playing on a routine that some people have in the middle. We actually might. My daughter loves Oreo and she also loves snickerdoodle, so that's her favorite. That kind of came mid table and at the bottom there's some crazy ones like pumpkin spice and tiramisu and stuff like that. So it's interesting, like, you know, you've got a whole range from near in to kind of quite far out ideas.
- [22:59]
Eugenie Azales
Exactly. And some are what we call, like fan favorites that we bring back because people absolutely love. And they expect them in certain times of the year. Right. So they have a little bit of a seasonal. Seasonal effect to it. I'd love to know how you eat your Oreo, John. You never shared.
- [23:14]
John Evans
Well, no, I didn't. Well, I. I'm quite boring because I literally go straight, straight to it. So rather than twist, I just literally just bite through.
- [23:22]
Eugenie Azales
That's good.
- [23:22]
John Evans
So how many people do that? Where am I on the spectrum of.
- [23:26]
Eugenie Azales
I wouldn't be able to tell you the number, but I think it's a British.
- [23:29]
John Evans
I think it's British thing.
- [23:30]
Eugenie Azales
Maybe it might be British, but I wouldn't say that that's boring.
- [23:33]
John Evans
Okay, thank you.
- [23:36]
Eugenie Azales
Please keep doing it.
- [23:37]
John Evans
I love the fact that there's a whole lot of intel on how people eat their Oreos. That's great. Love it. Now you must go around the world and see a huge amount of innovation. What is the craziest innovation that you get to see in your category?
- [23:49]
Eugenie Azales
Oh, my God. I think Oreo has the craziest innovation award. So, I mean, there's lots of fun things, especially, you know, last year we were in Korea. You know, there's just so much fun to be had in food, which, you know, coming from beauty and personal care. This has been really something for Oreo, though. I think the craziest one I've seen was spicy chicken wings, wasabi, all in China.
- [24:14]
John Evans
In an Oreo.
- [24:15]
Eugenie Azales
In an Oreo. In an Oreo. That's quite a thing. Yeah.
- [24:18]
John Evans
I remember going to China. Sorry, not China, Japan. Japan's got some weird stuff going on. I mean, the amount of innovation they do. I mean, we were talking to. I think it's Suntory. And like in the uk, you might do, I don't know, three or four big innovations a year. They do one every single week. They have weekly innovation cycles and then within days they decide if it's going to work. Or not. And then they take it out again and they put. Put a new one back in. But I'm being at the airport and like KitKat had like Wasabi flavored Kit Kat. That's just the weirdest thing.
- [24:49]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, it's quite weird, yeah. In the US we did this collaboration with Ritz, which was quite wild as well.
- [24:54]
John Evans
Right, Ritz, the savory biscuits, is that.
- [24:57]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, yeah.
- [24:57]
John Evans
With Ritz, it's quite a mix of savory and sweet.
- [24:59]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah. And I would put Coca Cola up there Right. On some of the craziest flavors, I think so.
- [25:04]
John Evans
So which, which of the crazy innovations has surprised you by being successful that you didn't think was going to succeed? Because I think it's. It's because it. One of these things we kind of debate is like, you know, you want to be different but not too different. You want to be familiar and close to the brand, but you want to also be novel. So there's often a tension, isn't there, between kind of how much do I push it? And occasionally some weird concept might.
- [25:26]
Eugenie Azales
Honestly, I would say Coca Cola. Not that I didn't believe in it, of course, but it's one that initially you're like, oh, is this really gonna taste good? And you try it and. And I was pleasantly surprised. I think it's an amazing taste and a great interpretation of a Coca Cola. So it really surprised me.
- [25:45]
John Evans
I suppose vanilla Coke has succeeded in the past, hasn't it? So there is a little bit of.
- [25:50]
Eugenie Azales
History of something of little bit of.
- [25:51]
John Evans
You know, association there between the two. You mentioned earlier, didn't you, about. About super bowl last year and one of the standout ads last year I think was the one you did. And what I loved about it was the fact that, you know, most super lads got celebrities in, you know, they're kind of high drama and. But you kind of get lost in what on earth is being advertised. But what I love about we did last year is absolutely obvious that it was from you. So just for anyone who hasn't seen your campaign from last year, just talk through the idea because I think the idea is brilliantly executed and really brings home the point about playfulness.
- [26:24]
Eugenie Azales
Very good. I'm glad you liked it.
- [26:27]
John Evans
It scored very well, by the way. It was, I think, a four and a half star on. On our system one scale.
- [26:31]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, I think it's number four on effectiveness. I think even on the rankings are number eight on video, something like that. Yeah, it's definitely on the top 10 of the ads last year. And it kind of. Kind of follows what we were talking about before, around the beauty of Oreo and the product truth of playing with an Oreo. So really the insight is around, you know, the kind of, like, lots of decisions that happen day in, day out where we need to make a decision, and that's actually quite adult and quite serious, and you kind of, like, sometimes wish, like, someone else would make that decision for you. So that's really where the insight comes from. And the way we executed it for the super bowl was relooking at the history of humanity almost through the lens of twisting on an Oreo and how decisions were made with the twist of an Oreo, which was super fun and very appropriate for the super bowl, with Kris Jenner, of course, as the cherry on top, trying to guess who was gonna win the Super Bowl. But we are now taking that idea to, like, everyday situations as well. Like, you know, two girls watching, you know, Netflix and deciding whether they should binge watch, you know, all night the show or go to sleep, and how they twist an Oreo to make that decision. And the same campaign lives in Europe under a different tagline. But it's just, you know, similar idea around trusted twist, which is, you know, twisting an Oreo to make decisions, like, you know, a girl challenging the mom, you know, to choose her outfit to go to work. Or, you know, and of course, the Oreo twisted that side and the mum goes to work dressed up as a mermaid. So lots of, you know, we can have lots of fun by just, like, bringing the playfulness of the Oreo to, you know, people's lives.
- [28:13]
John Evans
I mean, what I love about it is, is it can only be you. Right, because you've got that history of the twist. And there's endless possibilities with where you could take that, you know, you know, online in store, the amount of scenarios that it could solve, world peace, negotiation. I mean, imagine. It's endless, isn't it, in terms of the application of it?
- [28:30]
Eugenie Azales
It is. It is. It's a big idea with. With big legs.
- [28:33]
John Evans
Yeah. So we expect to see some more of it.
- [28:35]
Eugenie Azales
Expect to see more of it.
- [28:36]
John Evans
More coming now to Super Bowl. I think you must be one of the only brands in the history of super bowl to win a Cannes lion for a tweet.
- [28:44]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah.
- [28:44]
John Evans
As well. Just explain what happened. This is back in 2013, before I.
- [28:49]
Eugenie Azales
Joined the brand, of course. But it's, it's, you know, internally we talk about it like that was the. The start of the, you know, social era. Right. For Oreo, where we really I mean, the brand was reactive to culture in real time. And back then, it was. It was not something that, you know, was. Was a common thing. Right. In the marketing industry and very much anchored on the product and the brand. Right. So I think what enabled that to happen was, you know, a real understanding of what the brand's all about and the willingness to just like, engage in cultural conversations, which is something we carry to this day with our social channels and. And Oreo really kind of like shaping culture and being, you know, in the front of many conversations. But it was, yeah, one of those historical. You know, I wish I. I was.
- [29:36]
John Evans
There, but, yeah, it was good. If anyone who wasn't watching Super Bowl, I. I missed it at the time, but I read the case afterwards. But I think it's 2013 and there was a over 30 minute outage. So the power went out in the game. And in that 30 minutes, you put up a tweet saying you can still dunk in the dark with a kind of black background. But it had an Oreo just in the corner of the image. I thought it was very clever. And it had tens of thousands.
- [30:02]
Eugenie Azales
Crazy. Yes.
- [30:03]
John Evans
I mean, I mean, I don't know, it's always hard to know, you know, with kind of media valuations, but it claimed 500 million equivalent. Immediate. I always, always find those statistics a bit crazy, but incredible. And won a Cannes line that year.
- [30:16]
Eugenie Azales
It did.
- [30:17]
John Evans
For one tweet. It's quite impressive, isn't it?
- [30:19]
Eugenie Azales
The cheaper Cannes lions.
- [30:21]
John Evans
I was going to say the cheapest Cannes lion in the history of Cannes lions, definitely. Now, talking of Cannes, that's where you and I met, because you were out there talking about humor, weren't you? You're on a panel about humor, and I think it was called Humor's Just left the chat. Now, your brand, that leans very much into humor, why is humor not used more, do you think, in communication these days?
- [30:40]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, that was last year, I remember. And we had that great conversation with other brands as well. Like, if everyone knows how powerful humor is and we all read the same reports, why is it that not only we don't use it enough, but it's in decline? Right. And there's a few things we hypothesize, Right? One is that it's just hard. It's more difficult. It's difficult to control. And especially the topic I was asked to bring to the panel was, is it that global brands find it even harder? And I would say yes, because especially if you're thinking about one global production, one edit or not even global production, but like the need to control every piece of work that happens around the world. That's nearly impossible because as we all know, humor is very culturally driven. We don't laugh at the same things, right? The cultural norms, the nuances, the behaviors. I think in that panel we talked about the Office, right? The show from Netflix that is one. I think it's the most streamed, but it has how many different versions? And when you really study the different versions, actually the jokes are different, right? People are laughing at different things. What an Office looks like in different parts of the world is different. What happens at the coffee place is different. But what we do at Oreo that I think has been super successful and useful for us is to really identify at the core, not only values and beliefs, but a very clear set of tone of voice principles. So we worked really hard with the markets, with our agency on how does Oreo show up and what's her tone of voice? And we captured it in three distinct ideas that have two kind of like conflicting words at its heart. And we spend a lot of time looking at examples. What does that look like? What does it look like when it's too much of it? What does it look like when it's too little and when we're being a little bit safe? What are the boundaries? What are the guardrails? We literally went to a room and had like a million posted. You know, one of those, like old fashioned, you know, real workshops. We brought examples from around the world and comms. And then we encouraged every market to run that same workshop with their own local comms, looking at examples from their market. So those guardrails are super helpful. Now that we have guardrails, we can really blow it out and be humorous in a way that makes sense for the brand globally as a global icon, but also resonates with the consumer in the market. So that's how we kind of like went about it. But it's really. It is one of the barriers, I think.
- [33:16]
John Evans
Yeah, I mean, humour's amazingly powerful. I mean, there's an old G.K. chesterton quote about humor can get in the door while seriousness is still fumbling at the handle, which I think is absolutely lovely. And in fact, at System One, we measure emotion people feel when they watch nad, and happiness is usually the biggest emotion, which is what you want to achieve. But we looked at the types of happiness. It turns out there are lots of different types of, you know, feeling happy. It always makes me laugh this when we show people, because the number one type of happiness. Do you know what it is? Schadenfreude.
- [33:47]
Eugenie Azales
Oh no.
- [33:49]
John Evans
So exactly. Number two actually was amusement and then right at the bottom is things like pride for others and so on. So I mean there's 15 different types of happiness we track. But anyway. But the point is, hum. I mean schadenfreude's a form of humor as well. The top two types of happiness that are linked to business effects are, you know, our humor. So you know, we know humor is important, we know it's powerful, but we don't see many brands leaning in.
- [34:12]
Eugenie Azales
And that's the nuanced work we did. Right. I mean is it slapstick, is it satire, is it realistic, is it imaginative? Like we started really trying to break it apart. Right. As precise as we could. So it's the, you know, freedom within a framework, you know, kind of like creativity kind of like really is unleashed when you have a tight understanding. So that's what we try.
- [34:33]
John Evans
You're right about the freedom and the framework as well, because I was doing some work, I think it was on Pizza Hut and it was a very funny. It was American film. It's very, very funny. And we tested it and it's five star and the UK team weren't quite sure. So can you test it in the uk and we're going to roll it out in France as well and it's five star here, three star in the uk, one star in France. But you could see literally that the humor just didn't translate and the personality as well because the person they were using was well known here. A little bit known in uk, totally not known in France. So again, you know, the personality, the in jokes, the cultural references, all those things, you know, it's all, it's all part of humor, isn't it? The fact that we all understand the context, the joke.
- [35:16]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, exactly. It's very rare, I think, that you have those universal jokes that everyone laughs at. Right. But it's, it's, it's more like the exception.
- [35:23]
John Evans
Yes, yes. I think maybe, maybe Hollywood films or something, you know, where it's like blockbusters that are probably, you know, the world over or maybe, you know, people falling over or something. You know, like slapstick is probably the one case that's, that's a little bit different. So bring us upstate with this year then. What did you do this year for Super Bowl?
- [35:44]
Eugenie Azales
So we were not at super bowl this year. We took a, we took a year stuff.
- [35:49]
John Evans
You did a collaboration with Post Malone, didn't you?
- [35:51]
Eugenie Azales
We did, we were not at Super Bowl. Exactly. It was our big bet for, you know, Q1, which is, I actually have cookies for you, John. So I'm gonna.
- [35:58]
John Evans
Oh, this is great. We're gonna do this live on air.
- [36:00]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, let's do it.
- [36:01]
John Evans
Let's do it live on air. This is good. Let's do it now. Most people, when they do celebrity like partnerships, they. They just have the celebrity, like, appear on the ad. Right? But apparently Post Malone had a big involvement in this, didn't he?
- [36:14]
Eugenie Azales
That's right, yeah.
- [36:15]
John Evans
So tell me about that.
- [36:16]
Eugenie Azales
Yes, he said it right. He claimed he's like, I think this is the best Oreo ever. So that's what he said. I'm gonna try it now. Not that I haven't tried it.
- [36:25]
John Evans
We're gonna put Post Malone to the test now.
- [36:26]
Eugenie Azales
Post Malone to the test. So he really wanted an Oreo twist. So he designed this Oreo. Of course, we helped him, but it was him who developed this Oreo, which is salted caramel and shortbread. You're gonna see the swirl inside if you twist it. I know you don't twist, but I.
- [36:42]
John Evans
Think I'm try twisting now. I can. Does smell very good, actually. There's. There's definitely salted caramel going on there.
- [36:49]
Eugenie Azales
So there's a lot going on on this Oreo. It's one of the most, like, flavorful Oreos. Really tasty, lots of things going on in your mouth. Like Posty himself.
- [36:59]
John Evans
Right, okay, so here we go. For the taste test, I'm going to go for how I do it at home.
- [37:03]
Eugenie Azales
I'm doing it as well.
- [37:08]
John Evans
Now. I'm a massive salted caramel fan anyway, so whereas producer James will tell you, I. A nice caramel latte is like my first drink of the day, isn't it?
- [37:17]
Eugenie Azales
What you said is very true around how this is not just like a promotion, right. Like slapping Posty on the point of sale. Right. This is a genuine collaboration and we bring kind of like the word of Oreo to Postie and Postie to Oreo. And I think it's a similar principle to how we executed Coca Cola. Right. I think it's two things coming together, really.
- [37:39]
John Evans
And is this us only or have you done something?
- [37:42]
Eugenie Azales
This one is us only, but we do have something up coming, very exciting that's going to be global. We do a few that are more, you know, local. Like as I was talking about Wednesday in Brazil, for example, they did a huge collaboration with the Wednesday show and that was Brazil only. We're now doing a collaboration With Pokemon in Southeast Asia. So we have a, a combination of like some really powerful local ones that we work on and then some global.
- [38:10]
John Evans
Ones having lots of fun. I can see what's the kind of creative process you go through to come up with these ideas.
- [38:15]
Eugenie Azales
You know, I think there's, there's a bit of like an art and a science on the process. I would say around, you know, we were joking about the numbers. We definitely look at numbers, but we also look at, you know, the potential for being buzz worthy and reaching new audiences and tapping onto fandoms and whether it's aligned to the brand values and it makes sense. So definitely chaotic and art and science, but it makes sense at the end.
- [38:43]
John Evans
Well, a lot of this innovation is often about creating pr, isn't it? And noise around the brand that wouldn't be there if you'd done something just such the core.
- [38:53]
Eugenie Azales
That's exactly right. We work a lot with our advertising agencies, PR agencies, digital agencies, everyone working together. And PR is a big, big component behind some of the collaborations for sure.
- [39:05]
John Evans
I want to talk to you a little bit about kind of leadership style and what you've learned on your journey. Obviously, you know, 20 years you talked about at Unilever, now leading Oreo globally in a big organization, big brand. I mean, I think 4.5 billion at the last check. I think when I saw your results, which is very impressive. What's the secret to leading such a big organization?
- [39:24]
Eugenie Azales
I mean, I don't think there's one secret and maybe if it is, I haven't found it yet. But what, what worked for me at least is. And that happened quite early on in my career, I have to say. I had the gift of attending authentic leadership training back in the days. This was maybe like 30 years ago when I joined Unilever, called True north and the company really gifted us with one week to go inwards and find who are we, who do we want to be as leaders and why are we doing what we're doing. And really find. Before Simon Sinek came with the book really Find our why this was like 30 years ago. And I think I truly embraced that concept of authentic leadership and servant leadership. And that's probably how I define myself. I love that quote around like leadership is not about being in charge, but it's about taking care of those that you're in charge of. And I try to model that every day. So it's about really serve and leadership. The other big thing that worked for me, I think it's about painting a picture and Having a vision. I think it's so much easier to align agendas, conflict resolution, navigate different interests when there's one common goal for everyone, that it's not personal. So it's not about me, it's about what we are all doing together and really, you know, like, being optimistic and positive and really helping people imagine what the future could look like and lead from there, really lead from possibilities. And I think that's, you know, money follows vision, as they say. So I think there's a lot of that going on. For me, that worked.
- [41:06]
John Evans
Yeah. The vision things I think often overlooked, isn't it? But, like, you know, it's so powerful, isn't it, when you. When you. When you show people where you could go and give people an image, you know, I mean, actually going back to my Luke said example, we did the same similar sort of thing. We're a bit stuck. But we then said, you know, our mission. Mission rather than vision. But our mission was to kind of get a million people in the UK moving again or moving more. And then suddenly, once you've got something tangible that you can, you know, point to, it's amazing how motivating that is, then you can track against it and, you know, everyone's pushing in the same.
- [41:35]
Eugenie Azales
Direction and the problems seem to go away, you know, all of the potential barriers, just like.
- [41:40]
John Evans
Yeah, it makes decision making much easier as well, I find, because if you know exactly where you're going, then you judge everything by the destination rather than, you know, if you haven't got that, then you kind of decide between everything.
- [41:50]
Eugenie Azales
Exactly, exactly. And I think for, you know, big companies like, you know, the ones I worked with or Mondelez, there's a lot of alignment to be made and. And sometimes these companies can spend a lot of time, like, looking inwards. So I think when you paint that picture, that is. It's competitive, that's out there, that's inspirational. It kind of like reframes what we're doing.
- [42:12]
John Evans
So that's a good point. How. I mean, how do you. I mean, I'm not very good at this, by the way, this. In terms of alignment in big organizations, I've. I've got tripped up a few times on it. But how do you navigate a big organization successfully? Because you're in charge of the brand globally, aren't you? Huge, you know, huge business brands in different stages in different markets. You know, you've got, you know, lots of people presumably, have got a point of view on what you're doing. How do you navigate all that?
- [42:35]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, Some days are harder than others. Yeah, I'm not gonna lie. But I think I personally, I think I thrive in those environments, you know, different to you. I think it. I bring my, you know, like, real genuine interest in doing something together that's gonna be better than if we do it separate. So it kind of like, it doesn't bother me as much as other people. Like, like, you know, your case. But I think at the end of the day, there's a lot. There's a lot that I try to do around. Trying to almost like break the myth of like opposing. Like, we tend to sometimes think it's short term, long term, it's local, global, it's, you know, execution or strategy, creative. So really spend time reframing what we're trying to do. What's the question we're trying to answer. Bring everyone's perspective. So almost like slow down to go faster. Then I think the more we can stop down and listen to each other, there's much more commonalities and agreements on what we're trying to do than conflict. So it's a little bit of a mediator role sometimes and lead from real, I think authentic, empathetic, that everyone, we're all trying to do the same thing, but sometimes we come from different places. It takes a bit more time.
- [43:52]
John Evans
It doesn't it? Well, that's why the vision is so important, isn't it? Because if you all agree on the vision and where you're going, it makes. Makes the conflict resolution much, much, much easier. So what advice would you give somebody listening to this now that wants to follow in a similar career path to you, maybe aspires to be one day like, you know, a role like yours. What, what should they do?
- [44:11]
Eugenie Azales
I mean, I would say take every experience and look at it as a learning opportunity and try to expose yourself to as many diverse experiences as possible. You know, there's no bad. There's no bad role. Right. At the end of the day, it's all about a mindset for me. And yeah, have fun.
- [44:31]
John Evans
Well, you are having fun. I have to say, I can confirm by, you know, just. Just an example of this. But yeah, a lot of fun. I mean, I think the having fun bit, I know we're joking about it because obviously it's Oreo, but actually being able to enjoy what you do is incredibly powerful, isn't it? Because then you're going to work harder at it. It doesn't. It won't feel as difficult to do it.
- [44:48]
Eugenie Azales
Yeah, yeah, and it's a joke, but it's not, you know, like, I really think at Oreo, we try to live the brand purpose every day. Sometimes it's harder when things get hard, but, you know, stay playful. We try to embody it. You know, in our meetings we have instead of breaks, we have cookie breaks and we have a cookie and, you.
- [45:07]
John Evans
Know, I'll be disappointed if you didn't have cookie breaks, to be honest.
- [45:09]
Eugenie Azales
And the playbooks and we say every meeting needs to have at least one giggle, you know, something that we can laugh about. Because if that's what we want to do in the world, I mean, it would be quite hypocrite if we don't do it ourselves.
- [45:20]
John Evans
So that's true. I think one of the most useful frameworks I came across years and years ago, but was just looking at mapping out, what are you passionate about? What do you enjoy doing? Yeah. And then, and then what, what problems does a company need to solve? And you look for the overlap and just go, you know, in the case I was working, I was, I loved coming up with ideas and particularly innovation ideas and product ideas. And at the time the company had struggled repeating those because it had grown very quickly and the portfolio become complicated. So I said, I'm going to solve how we deliver ideas through the organ, how we bring them to market, given that, you know, it's become more complex and got signed off in about three or four months. And it reminded me that sometimes you can kind of create your own future, but you need to start by being really clear about what you enjoy doing and where, you know, you can add value in the organization.
- [46:09]
Eugenie Azales
Exactly. And you can shape your roles. Right. I think it's not. That's a little bit of like, you know, this is what you know you've been given, but this is what you can give back. So, yeah, take, take control.
- [46:21]
John Evans
Indeed. And have a lot of fun and which you're clearly doing, which is great to see. So, Eugenia, thank you so much for coming and sharing your story on Uncensored cmo. It's been a lot of fun. Thank you for the post Malone biscuits as well, which I'll enjoy taking with me.
- [46:34]
Eugenie Azales
Very good. Thanks, John. It's been a pleasure. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.
- [46:38]
John Evans
Take care.
- [46:38]
Eugenie Azales
Thank you.
- [46:39]
John Evans
Thank you very much for listening or watching Uncensored cmo. I hope you enjoyed that. If you did, please do hit the subscribe button and wherever you get your podcast, if you're watching, hit subscribe there as well. I'd also love to get a review. Reviews make a big difference on other people discovering the show. So please do leave a review wherever you get your podcast. If you want to contact me, you can do I'm over on XcensorCMO or on LinkedIn where I'm under my own name, John Evans. Thanks for listening and watching. I'll see you next time.