The Triumphant Return of Colonel Sanders
& Kentucky Fried Chicken
In 2015, Kentucky Fried Chicken needed a big win.
The iconic restaurant chain, known for its feisty mustachioed founder and its super secret recipe, had been struggling in its home market, facing over 35 quarters of straight sales declines in the US, despite seeing significant success abroad. Armed with a rich history, a new senior leadership team, and a strong set of core values, KFC came to Wieden + Kennedy to kick off one of the most impressive brand turnarounds in recent history.
Through nimble campaign windows built around an innovative menu and a newly elevated dining experience, KFC leveraged digital and traditional media avenues to create noteworthy ad campaigns that placed the brand in the news, driving awareness and brand affinity at unprecedented levels. This resulted in a sales and store visit turnaround that reversed consecutive quarters of decline into record-breaking quarter-over-quarter growth and numerous awards for breakthrough creative, comms, and effectiveness.
My contributions:
Digital Strategy
Brand Planning & Campaign Strategy
Communications & PR Strategy
Direct Response & CRM
Data Analytics & Reporting
Copywriting (for social)
Highlights
How we got KFC’s Twitter account on the Today Show and broke the internet twice in two weeks.
My contributions
Twitter Strategy
Planning
PR Strategy
Creative Concepting
Extra Crispy Sunscreen
To help launch KFC’s Extra Crispy fried chicken campaign, we created a sunscreen that smelled like fried chicken. We built a microsite and create a social media campaign to give away the sunscreen to hungry, skin-cancer aware KFC fans. We sold out of all 20,000 bottles in under 48 hours, days later some of the bottles were selling on ebay for more than $300.
Contributions
Creative, Strategy, Execution
Coverage:
Time
Adweek
Eater
Refinery29
We made a playable football game on Instagram to help drive attention for KFC’s $20 Fill Up, and also because why not? ‾\_(ツ)_/‾
Though the execution was primarily designed for Instagram, fans could also play on Facebook. Average play time was over 3 minutes.
My contributions
Facebook & Instagram Strategy
Planning
Execution
Colonel Sanders Does ASMR to Sell Fried Chicken
In an extension of the uber successful Extra Crispy fried chicken campaign with George Hamilton, we tapped into the strange and amazing subculture of ASMR, or auto-sensory meridian response, a phenomenon where sounds can cause physical reactions. Launched on Youtube, our video featured The Colonel giving fans a tutorial on how to fold a handkerchief while munching extra crispy, extra crunchy fried chicken. Our video was well-received by many influencers in the ASMR community (yes, this is a real thing) and helped kick off our Colonel’s adventure into many different sub-cultures to drive awareness and affinity with different audiences.
The original video had to be pulled due to licensing expiration, but you can see a fan-uploaded video here.
My contributions:
Campaign Strategy
Youtube Strategy
Production & Art Direction Support
Social media promotion
Coverage:
AdAge
Washington Post
Chicago Tribune
ASMR University
Case Studies
ContentMarketing.com
Medium - Trendwatching
The Colonel takes over WWE Summerslam 2016
The Colonel would go to any length to sell his world-famous fried chicken. In this case, that means battling a phony chicken competitor chump in a center ring battle at WWE’s SummerSlam.
To connect with a highly relevant sub-culture in WWE fans, KFC turned co-op advertising on its head by integrating Colonel Sanders into the WWE world. The short fight was aired during SummerSlam and supported with real-time social media content engaging with fans, giving them their own wrestling names dubbed by The Colonel himself.
My contributions
Social media strategy
Real-time engagement and community management
Content production assistance