As a challenger brand in a crowded QSR field, Wendy’s always needs to punch above their weight. Wendy’s counterpunched fast-food rivals when they launched Breakfast in 2020, but the challenges of introducing a new daypart during Covid required more efforts throughout 2021 to drive consumer consideration and sales growth. Summer seasonality presented additional hurdles to creating purchase frequency within the breakfast business. In 2020, Wendy’s tapped into the Rick and Morty frenzy with a branded content partnership built on Gen Z/Millennial fan passion, a shared sensibility, and animated talking food. Engagement leapt +171% over benchmarks, and 83% of fans surveyed said the partnership favorably differentiated Wendy’s

Rick and Morty fans really, really get impatient waiting for a new season to drop. Fan anticipation goes into overdrive as fans scour the internet for hints and teasers. Wendy’s wanted to share some of that Ricktastic joy.

Rick and Morty crisscross the multiverse, popping in and out through interdimensional portals. Imagine fan reactions if a portal opened up in Los Angeles, just prior to the global premiere.

Wendy’s wanted to grab the attention of Rick and Morty fans via spontaneous, breakthrough content that would get them to try breakfast, fuse Wendy’s with Rick and Morty, and drive appeal to soda lovers with custom Rick and Morty inspired Coca Cola Freestyle flavor mixes available in over 5,000 Wendy’s nationwide. This large activation needed to make a splash, while also entertaining and engaging audiences at national scale.

The interdimensional portal opened beneath a Wendy’s – and overnight it would be transformed into Morty’s – driving through Rick’s 15’ mouth, plunging through an exclusive animation experience, ordering Morty’s menu, imbibing Pickle Rick Frosty, then exiting out through Morty’s mouth. An immersion that fans wouldn’t stop talking about, sharing, and posting.

Rick and Morty doesn’t just have fans – they have superfans who know the entire canon. This partnership activation had to exceed already high expectations – and stoke fan FOMO such that fans would drive hours to participate.

Los Angeles already boasts one of Rick and Morty’s biggest concentration of superfans, in part because the Los Angeles creative community are big fans. It didn’t require much prompting for the word about an upcoming Rick and Morty’s event to galvanize the fan community. Word spread quickly as this pop up stunt was being set up. By Friday morning, the line was already forming and fans were clamoring to secure their spot in the multiverse. Waiting for up to 9 hours did not phase fans and in the end, everyone exclaimed it was worth the wait.

Morty’s immersed fans online and in real life, meeting them across multiple experience and installation touchpoints. Fans entered by driving through the mouth of a giant inflated Rick. Between the inflatable heads a path was lined with LED panels showcasing custom animation, created for this experience, while fans waited for their food. After receiving their orders for Morty’s, they exited through a giant inflatable Morty head who was sporting the iconic Wendy’s pigtails, where they stopped for a photo-op.

Morty’s drive-thru 3-day LA activation celebrated the launch of Season 5 of Rick and Morty. Original animation from the production team was looped on the interdimensional tunnel, creating mind-blowing and share-ready social content. More than 2,000 cars came through, with wait times stretching to 9 hours. Response was overwhelmingly positive across all social channels. Content included drone footage and micro-influencers who attended and posted for Instagram, Twitter and TikTok.

The Morty’s installation achieved unprecedented demand as carloads of superfans traveled distances to wait in up to 9 hour lines at our busiest times (approx. 2mi of cars)! Content from the event was captured and huge earned outreach cumulatively delivered massive impact of over half a billion multi-channel impressions (+237MM had a 99% positive tone) extending far beyond the LA experience, giving it sustained social longevity at national scale.

Paid Social performed substantially above engagement and video view benchmarks across engagement and video views, and a parallel campaign further extended our partnership to Fandom to give fans more interactive Rick & Morty content through the Fandom 5 trivia show.

Wendy’s achieved success in the Breakfast daypart, with +120-140% increases in YOY breakfast sales, plus consistent increases in weekly average breakfast sales contributions to Wendy’s full day mix. Additionally, our intergalactic beverages we’re among the highest performing custom Coke flavors EVER!