Challenge

Heinz has a ton of brand heritage. But heritage cuts as much as it kisses. Heinz is your builder’s breakfast, your nan’s supper. Roger Daltry sat in a bathtub of beans. And while generations have grown up knowing Heinz, for many younger customers, the brand had been relegated to the status of boring kitchen staple and hadn’t kept pace with current food trends, such as vegan diets and flexitarian cooking.   

Our research showed that there was a huge opportunity to put Heinz back into the consciousness of customers who were looking for more varied and alternative diets and engage them with the versatility and health credentials of a brand that has always been 90% plant based.  

Strategy

To capitalise on the market opportunity, we worked with Heinz to repackage their range of vegan products under a new creative proposition: ‘Made from Plants’.

This proposition neatly covered a broad portfolio of products, from classic Heinz plant-based ingredients like Heinz Beanz and Heinz Tomato Ketchup, to vegan-specific options such as Heinz Seriously Good Vegan Mayo, Heinz Beanz Bugerz and Heinz Plant Proteinz.  

Solution

We planned to launch this range campaign to market at the start of Veganuary 2022, but we knew that at a time when our plant-based competitors were spending aggressively on broadcast media, a traditional ATL formula wasn’t going to cut the Yellow Mustard. Instead, we needed an approach that changed conversations about the brand, without sounding like we were jumping on the vegan bandwagon.   

We leapfrogged the Veganuary spenders by creating a social-first branded content series in partnership with Channel 4. Our five-part comedy cooking show, Flex Kitchen, turned up the heat on five of the country’s favourite comedians – Alex Brooker, Kerry Godliman, Suzi Ruffell, Lou Sanders and Phil Wang – as they cooked for some very demanding diners.

With the Heinz Made from Plants range as the stars of the show, each 10-minute episode put our comedians through their paces as they are faced with their own hungry, but hard-to-please customers. What would they rustle up when all they’ve got is their wits, some spare ingredients, and a talking microwave? 

Flex Kitchen debuted on Channel 4 Comedy YouTube and All 4, while shorter edits of each episode were released across Channel 4 and Heinz’s Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and TikTok accounts, and a bespoke edit from the series appeared as the supporting TV and digital ads.

This social-first approach was delivered in a fun and authentic way, harnessing the power of entertainment to show that Heinz can make plant-based eating more accessible, without compromising on taste, or fun.