The average Belgian citizen eats only half of the recommended portion of fruits and vegetables.

Over the past years supermarket chain Lidl made it its mission to promote eating fresh food.

On the other hand, certain fresh foods took on a new (digital) meaning and became more and more widely accepted as a love message, and thus became very popular in the digital space. Lidl saw this as an opportunity to promote fresh food in an unexpected way, at an unexpected time: Valentine's day.

Supermarket chain Lidl hijacked Valentine’s Day 2019 by giving the three most popular digital love emojis a fresh counterpart. We developed a new packaging for bananas, eggplants and peaches to be given as a message. The packaging window resembled a text message balloon that's sent on a mobile phone, that can now be given in real life, as a fresh gift on Valentine's day. On the backside, people could personalize their message box with a written message.

We distributed it nationwide and sampled it in busy areas, for those who didn’t make it to the store. This limited edition packaging promoted fruits and vegetables in a contemporary way and was used as a means to make them as attractive and appealing as they are when we receive them in a digital message.

The average Belgian eats only half of the recommended dose of fruits and vegetables. On the other hand, large quantities of digital fruits and vegetables are sent, mostly as a love message.

We took the three most popular love emojis: the eggplant, the peach and the banana and gave them a new packaging: real emojis. The front displayed the fruit or vegetable as an emoji, the blank space on the back was a call to action to write a personal message.

We chose Valentine's day, a peak moment where a lot of these emojis are sent, to distribute our message boxes in stores and through samplings. We announced the campaign through radio and a social post.

On Valentine's day 2019, a day where a lot of love emoji's are sent, we distributed 10 000 limited edition message boxes in stores and through samplings. The boxes could hold the largest eggplants, bananas and peaches Lidl had to offer. They had a window that looked like a text balloon, that made it look like a real text message on a mobile phone.

We announced this limited edition packaging via radio and social posts.

Target audience (18-54): 5482635

Total reach (in store + radio campaign + social + sampling) : 2447203,98

Total number of limited edition message boxes distributed: 10 000