Why is this work relevant for Brand Experience & Activation?

In the Japanese market, Burger King is enormously behind McDonald’s. Seizing the opportunity of an outlet opening in Shimo-kita, a town that is popular with our strategic target of youth, we ambitiously undertook communication that focused on a single fan who was asking for an outlet to open in Shimo-kita to capture the favor of youth. We showed how Burger King is a brand that listens to and grants the wish of even just a single fan. We successfully built engagement as this communication instantly spread among youth, and we were flooded with tweets requesting new outlet openings.

Background

In Japan, McDonald’s holds dominance for hamburgers. Burger King is still a little-known brand, with just 100 outlets vs. McDonald’s having about 3,000. However, we wanted all of Japan to know the fact that the number of outlets is increasing in recent years. As part of this, Burger King decided to open a branch in Shimo-kita, where there is strong presence of our strategic target of youth. Unlike McDonald’s, which executes a general image strategy and targets all Japanese nationals, we touted the approach that “Burger King is a brand that values you as a unique individual” to create a bond with youth. We thus ambitiously developed this as branding, rather than a simple new outlet announcement.

Describe the creative idea (20% of vote)

In response to a single fan’s tweet saying, “Come make a Burger King in Shimo-kita,” the Burger King official account announced it was preparing to do so by replying “We are! We await you on opening day.” We took this Twitter conversation and plastered it over the entire front of the Shimo-kita outlet under construction.

Describe the strategy (20% of vote)

Our strategic target is youth, who frequently use fast food restaurants, and we focused on social media, which many of them actively use. Harnessing the situation that many people expressed on Twitter a desire for new openings because of the small number of outlets, we replied to a single fan who was asking for an outlet to open in Shimo-kita that we are preparing to do so. Instead of keeping this on Twitter, we posted the correspondence all over the front of the restaurant under construction. In this era of information overload, the announcement of a new outlet opening in a limited area would go unnoticed. Despite these circumstances, we aimed to create buzz by creating an attention-catching visual that shows how Burger King is a brand that listens to and grants the wish of even just a single fan.

Describe the execution (30% of vote)

On December 9, 2019, in response to a single fan’s tweet saying, “Come make a Burger King in Shimo-kita,” the Burger King official account announced it was preparing to do so by replying “We are! We await you on opening day.” On the same day, we took this Twitter conversation and plastered it over the entire front of the Shimo-kita outlet under construction. Passersby posted photos of this on Twitter, making the information quickly go viral. Despite being under construction, crowds gathered in front of the restaurant. On December 23, the day of opening, we welcomed a great number of customers, including the fan who posted the original tweet.

List the results (30% of vote)

A Twitter conversation, plastered over the front of the restaurant under construction. As people who saw this posted it on Twitter, it instantly spread throughout Japan as a “feel-good story,” including via internet media. Youth all over Japan rode the bandwagon on this correspondence, resulting in a mass number of tweets imitating the initial post, saying “Come make a Burger King in XXXX!” Having received requests for outlets in areas from all 47 prefectures, we successfully built engagement with the many youth on social media. ・Media impressions: 17,914,500 (December 9–23, 2019) ・Ad conversion value: 59,985,000 JPY (December 9–23, 2019) ・Retweets: 106,977 (Twitter, as of March 27, 2020) ・Likes: 359,512 (Twitter, as of March 27, 2020) ・New outlet request bandwagon tweets: 47 out of 47 prefectures