Youngsters prefer ‘cool’ American confectionery brands (Snickers and Mars) to ROM.Our solution was not to fight against, but to join them and thus challenge the young Romanians' national ego. We triggered a public debate about national values by launching a limited edition of an ‘American’ ROM – same product, same price, but branded with the US flag.We put the product in stores, encouraged sampling, announced the change in media, and stirred the debates. After one week, we made the reveal: the old ROM was back as Romanian as ever, while the American ROM became a collector’s item.

The campaign reached 67% of Romanians and generated €300,000 of free publicity.

The online response was phenomenal: in six days, ROM’s website had 75,000 unique visitors; Facebook fans rose by 300%; supporters launched petitions and organised a flash-mob in Bucharest.

All brand image indicators exploded, especially 'ROM is a brand for me', which more than doubled - a 124% increase.ROM outperformed the market, with 20% growth (compared to 8.2% category growth) in the most relevant channel, hypermarkets, while the American ROM was sold out.Most importantly, ROM ousted Snickers to become Romanians’ favourite chocolate bar (79% increase of the indicator).