The Campaign

Snack market size is around 23,000 Million baht in Thailand, including 4 categories; potato chips, extrude snacks, seaweeds and peanuts. New flavor is always the key strategic point that leads this industry. Teens are the main target consumption. Sunsnack is sunflower seed, in which consumer perception for sunflower seed is for the old-aged group. It’s kind of a good snack so the taste is not delicious like potato chips or extrude snacks. A new flavor of Sunsnack wanted to capture Thai teens who also has many choices with low brand loyalty to enjoy the snacks. A launch of new flavor of Sunsnack has to be different and give excitement to the brand. So we tried to make this new flavor more outstanding with the weird purpose.

Results

The Challenge: Sunsnack is sunflower seeds, in which consumer perception for sunflower seed is for the old-aged group. It’s kind of good snack so the taste is not delicious like potato chips or extrude snacks. New flavor is always the key strategic point that leads this industry. Sunsnack wanted to capture Thai teens who also has many choices with low brand loyalty to enjoy the snacks. A launch of new flavor “Spicy Beijing Duck” of Sunsnack has to be differentiate and give excitement to the brand as well as changing consumer perception towards the sunflower seed snack. The Objective: Sunsnack to build awareness of a new flavor 'Spicy Beijing Duck' by creating a buzz among Thai teens, using viral strategy to hype up curiosity and review a launch with impactful execution and unique product design pack shot. The Strategy: We learned that Thai teens like to watch and read mysterious stories that can’t be proved, like Dragon from China, or UFOs. So, we wanted to create a buzz though online by creating an intriguing viral clip that resembles an authentic Chinese newscast without branding and leaves viewers wondering if what they saw was in fact real. The Execution: We developed a viral clip that shot and produced to resemble an authentic Chinese newscast, the film presents a problem affecting a rural farming community in southern China. The short news clip presents a story about a farm whose ducks have mysteriously begun to emit flaming gas from their behinds. The ducks angry owner believes chemical pollution is the cause of this unprecedented phenomenon, but Chinese government scientists refuse to accept this explanation. The newscast ends without any branding and leaves viewers wondering if what they saw was in fact real. After a month of buzz building around this newscast, the film re-appeared with a different ending, promoting Sun Snack's new 'Hypercharged Spicy duck flavor'.

We learned that Thai teens like to watch and read mystery stories that can’t be proved like Dragon from China, or UFO. Tasked with launching Sunsnack's new 'Hypercharged Spicy Duck-Flavored', Leo Burnett Bangkok created an intriguing viral clip that shot and produced to resemble an authentic Chinese newscast. The film presents a problem affecting a rural farming community in southern China. The short news clip presents a story about a farm whose ducks have mysteriously begun to emit flaming gas from their behinds. The ducks angry owner believes chemical pollution is the cause of this unprecedented phenomenon, but Chinese government scientists refuse to accept this explanation. The newscast ends without any branding and leaves viewers wondering if what they saw was in fact real. After a month of buzz building around this newscast, the film re-appeared with a different ending, promoting Sun Snack's new 'Hypercharged Spicy duck flavor'.

In a few short weeks, this viral video clip was watched over 500,000 times online, and appeared on countless websites. It was even broadcast multiple times on Thai TV shows and news programmes. After a month of buzz building around this newscast, the film re-appeared with a different ending, promoting Sun Snack's new 'Hypercharged spicy duck flavor' and a 45 second film was cut to air in cable TV in the later month. The new ending led to an immediate 300% sales spike in Sun Snack's products, and millions of dollars worth of free PR for the brand. This carefully orchestrated campaign won over the Thai public with one of the most memorable fake newscasts the country has ever seen. The Sunsnack brand image itself has enjoyed the loved by Thai teens and perceived as the coolest seed snack in their mind, consequence to additional 20,000 fanpage liked and joined in Sunsnack brand Facebook page.