Advertiser: MAX BURGERS
Agency: McCANN STOCKHOLM
Category: Copywriting
Art Director: Cecilia Dufils (McCann Stockholm)
Director: Lars Ohlin (RBG6)
Account Director: Emma Pernald (McCann Stockholm)
Copywriter: Markus Bjurman (McCann Stockholm)
Art Director: Peter Eriksson (McCann Stockholm)
Producer: Ylva Axell (Aspekt)
Original Artwork: Daniel Köpman (McCann Stockholm)
Director: Joel Nordström (RBG6)
Account Manager: Jonna Liljedahl (McCann Stockholm)
Art Director: Patrik Reuterskiöld (McCann Stockholm)
Effectiveness
Up to June 2012 Max’s VATalicious campaign generated an estimated PR-value of 20.1 million SEK. Top-of-mind ad-awareness increased by 5%, while in-mind-awareness increased by 14%. Sales increased by 9%, which was 35% better than for the industry as a whole.The ambitious goals set was not only exceeded, they went large! The sales target of 6% was exceeded by 50%. Top-of-mind was exceeded by 66%, and in-mind by 68%.Within the target audience the associations to “low price” increased for Max more than any other brand attribute during 2012. Max increased their associations to “affordable”, and “price-value” was one variable that drove the improved brand relationship to Max during 2012.The “VATalicious” campaign became Max’s most talked about campaign and the phrase spread across social media. Even Sweden’s Minister of Commerce, Annie Lööf, quoted the campaign on her blog.
Campaign Description
From January 1st 2012 the Swedish government reduced the restaurant VAT. For Max Hamburger chain this was a great opportunity to get more customers and at the same time generate goodwill to the brand by creating new jobs for the youth. So Max lowered all their prices equal to the VAT reduction the same day as the VAT was reduced, January 1st 2012. At the same time they started to communicate their message – we have lowered all our prices and are giving back the entire reduction to our costumers. This was made through a large integrated multichannel campaign called VATalicious.With Max’s integrated “VATalicious” campaign they reached the consumers in a humoristic way. It was a campaign playing on the word VAT (Swedish word: moms). The word “moms” looks and sounds very much alike the Swedish word “mums” (English word: yummie). The somewhat dorky Swedish saying “mums filibabba” meaning that something is “very yummie” (delicious) was therefore very suitable to transform into “moms filibabba” (VATalicious, but with a much better sound to it).
Implementation
The 1st of January 2012 Max pushed the start button for the company’s most extensive integrated communication campaign ever. The campaign started to air on TV, radio, as ads in magazines/newspapers, online, and in Max’s social-media platforms from January 1st 2012. All their restaurants got a total overhaul including new props for the campaign “Moms Filibabba” (VATalicious). The humoristic campaign was to give the impression that the price reduction was greater than it actually was, getting a higher costumer satisfaction – creating a buzz around the campaign; and to let everyone know how delicious Max’s hamburgers are.PR work was carried out and consisted mostly of Max’s CEO wrote several debate articles during the campaign-time to both national and local newspapers where he urged other restaurants to also lower their prices – giving Max goodwill amongst the Swedish community. He also wrote letters to politicians saying Max would hire around 200 new employees during 2012. This made Max into a role model on how everyone both companies and consumers would benefit from the reduced VAT, which gave Max a lot of press coverage.This full-scale campaign ran until April 2012. The pay-off tag, Moms Filibabba, was used in TV-spots until June 2012. After this some follow-up PR was conducted. Again CEO, Richard Bergfors, wrote articles. The PR implementations ran until late June 2012, but the campaign signs and other props in the restaurants were there until September 2012.It started out with Max’s CEO wrote several debate articles to national and local newspapers early on in the discussion, summer of 2011. He also wrote letters to politicians, which made Max the given spokesperson and gave the VAT issue a lot of press coverage. One minute past midnight December 31st 2011 Max pushed the start button for the company’s most extensive integrated communication campaign ever.The campaign started to air on TV, radio, as ads in magazines, and Max's social media platforms from January 1st 2012. All their restaurants also got a total overhaul including new props for the campaign “Momsfilibabba”. The humoristic campaign was to give the impression that the price reduction was greater than it actually was, getting a higher costumer satisfaction – creating a buzz around the campaign; and to let everyone know how delicious Max’s hamburgers are.