FRIES HEIST

TitleFRIES HEIST
BrandGOLDEN ARCHES DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION
Product / ServiceMcDONALD'S
CategoryA05. Best Use or Integration of Experiential Events
EntrantLEO BURNETT MANILA, THE PHILIPPINES
Entrant Company LEO BURNETT MANILA, THE PHILIPPINES
Contributing Company LEO BURNETT MANILA, THE PHILIPPINES
Production Company SHOESTRING Makati City, THE PHILIPPINES

Credits

Name Company Position
Borgy Torre Director
Hit Production Soundesign
Steve Vesagas/Lester Parulan Producers
Trixie Angeles Leo Burnett Manila Account Executive
Maik Alturas Leo Burnett Manila Account Management Manager
Donny Dingcong Leo Burnett Manila Account Management Director
Stephanie Mangalindan Leo Burnett Manila Art Director
Raoul Panes/Aimee Espiritu Leo Burnett Manila Copywriters
Dante Dizon Leo Burnett Manila Creative Director
Raoul Panes Leo Burnett Manila Chief Creative Officer

The Campaign

The Philippines is said to be “The Social Networking Capital of the World”. Social network penetration is incredibly high at 95%. Facebook is the country’s most popular website with a penetration rate of 93.9%. The Philippines is also the eighth most popular country for Twitter use. The popularity of photo sharing has increased by 46% in the country in one year, largely due to Facebook. Furthermore, 9 out of 10 Filipinos own mobile phones. As in most countries, television is the prime source of advertisements but it is also the most expensive. Given these facts, digital and mobile are very attractive options for marketing efforts that are highly cost-efficient.

Results

We made a giant installation of McDonald’s French Fries and placed it in a leading shopping mall, Eastwood. This spurred families and friends to pose for pictures with our World Famous Fries. They then spontaneously shared the photos on social media sites. We had celebrities tweeting about and posting pictures of the giant fries. The digital world was abuzz with excitement. Days later, we made the fries disappear. Someone took the World Famous Fries! The public was shocked. Newspapers announced the “Fries Heist”. We deployed Ronald McDonald through a video where he asked for help in finding the fries. McDonald’s offered a reward. Daily, we released CCTV videos of the crime scene on McDonald’s Facebook page. Each video showed various characters as suspects: a couple, a maintenance man, a photographer, a jester, a delivery man. Finally, the hunt ended with a most unexpected culprit. With Fries Heist solved, we brought back the fries. People showed their love for the fries even more via social media.

The excitement about the giant fries installation was fuelled by us reposting Instagram photos of people posing with the giant fries installation on McDonald’s Facebook page which counts over 800,000 fans. Celebrities added to the excitement with their own posts. During the Heist, newspaper reports led them to the McDonald’s page. In the days that followed, we had daily updates on suspects. Such content were shared and reshared. On-ground prompts to the digital content in the form of “crime scene” notices were also on display in the now-empty fries box installation in the mall which has considerable foot traffic.

Fries Heist was much talked about. The Fries Heist Activation-Digital effort proved to be effective in terms of engaging consumers. Total online reach hit 4,502,368. This amounted to total viewing time of 128,924 minutes. We had everybody’s eyes on the fries! ! More importantly, Fries Heist helped increase McDonald’s French Fries sales by 12% versus the same period last year.