The modern food scene is a fast moving, layered and fascinating place. A scene of constant discovery, governed by experience, not commerce.

La Maison Maille’s Fête de la Gastronomie combined these rules with Maille’s centuries of French flavour expertise.

Our two-week festival recruited London’s most interesting and influential food producers and chefs to become Maille’s army of Flavour Creators.

Our Flavour Creators, all recruited for free through their passion for the project, created limited edition dishes sold in their restaurants, delis and market stalls. We love the idea of hundreds of individual food discoveries from our food-obsessed audience across the capital. The culmination of the festival saw London’s Southbank transformed into Paris’ iconic Left Bank in a gastronomic celebration of our flavour creators and their Maille dishes.

Our campaign had three main elements:

• First, our Flavour Creators. We used social data and our own connections in the food scene to identify nine influential chefs and food producers across the capital. The unpaid partnerships saw each influencer create a Maille inspired dish to sell throughout Fete de la Gastronomie, creating a vibrant culinary adventure around the city for people to take part in and enjoy.

• Second, we developed ‘at home’ versions of our Flavour Creator recipes, allowing discerning food lovers to copy their heroes and recreate the special Maille inspired dishes.

The campaign culminated in a celebration of French food on London’s famous Southbank. For one night, we transformed London’s Southbank into Paris’ Rive Gauche, creating an al fresco French banquet, bringing together all of the Maille-infused dishes from our Flavour Creators in a tasting menu for 200 people as a unique meeting of Parisian and London gastronomy.

Business:

• Maille’s Retail Sales Value grew by 13% in the four key months of the campaign period*

• Maille’s penetration of the mustard category increased by +64.5%YOY**

• During this time, London sales performance (the focus of our audience and our campaign) increased; e.g. sales in London Tesco stores increased in the range of 10-15% vs. the UK average. The impact was sustained, with Tesco’s London store sales growing 7% faster than total country sales

* May – August 2016

Audience:

• (Brand tracking results not completed at time of writing)

Media:

• 209 pieces of quality coverage in key titles for our audience including Guardian, Time Out, Harper’s Bazaar, Foodism and Evening Standard, +232% vs KPI

• Total reach: 38,021,750

• Total social reach: 1,840,426

Conclusion:

Creating standout in London’s food scene demands originality, creativity and bravery.

Maille’s ambitious Fête de-la Gastronomie delivers this and more; a two-week multi-layered festival that our audience took to their heart and scrambled to take part in. We placed Maille at the centre of their culinary adventures.

The resulting engagement, coverage and advocacy allowed the brand to deliver outstanding commercial results during La Fête and beyond.

Kirsty Beckman, Brand Manager, Maille UK&I:

“Fête de-la Gastronomie was a great success, creating clear impact in our discerning food lover audience. The campaign went above and beyond the brief, achieving impactful media coverage, mass reach and driving demonstrable commercial results. La Fête perfectly exemplified Maille’s expertise and passion in flavour.”