Walk on by
Walkers crisp’s new ad campaign is very clever and works from most angles. It has involvement from the public at all stages and a great TV ad (unlike the horrendously misjudged ‘Mud, glorious mud’ from last year!). The supporting website is bloated and not very well thought out, but even there the content is good.
People invent new crisp flavours and then 6 are chosen to be put into temporary production. Eventually one is chosen in an online poll to become a new, permanent flavour in the Walkers lineup. The end results are mostly great, but there’s one flavour that needs highlighting for discussion; Chilli and chocolate. This scores top marks on concept (classic combination) and on execution (the flavours are clearly defined and tasty). The reason it falls down is delivery, because it doesn’t work at all when you add potatoes into the equation and makes the whole thing taste, well, wrong
There is a logic to this. Most of the other flavours have potato integral to their makeup. For example the fish & chips (the chips), builders breakfast (hash browns), the Bhaji (an integral starchiness that’s needed) and even for the other two it makes a natural carrier for their flavours.
What chilli and chocolate’s downfall comes down to is logistics. As a delivery mechanism the crisp is just wrong, and when you’re ultimately flogging crisps rather than flavours that’s not a good thing.
Do you have any great ideas that will clash with what your core business is trying to sell? Best to think about it now before you end up at the bottom of the result table.
As long as it engages the target market, which it does by voting, it has vaguely done it’s job. But much better to engage then advertise to them.
I think they missed a trick by not having it as a mini-app in other websites, so that you can vote from the ad box.