Tesco is the first supermarket in the UK to turn their food into art. Devour was a branded experience to get consumers to see a new, premium side of Tesco and to experience Tesco Finest first hand in an exhibition you can eat.

Tesco had a problem. After 25 years of ‘Every Little Helps’, Tesco realised that their advertising strategy had worked a little too well. Everyone in the UK knew they were getting great value for money, but what they were forgetting was that Tesco also have a Finest range, with premium food and meals that rival a Michelin star restaurant.

So how were they going to convince the public that they weren’t just the supermarket known for half price sausages, but that they can actually do premium as well?

We were given £460k to do something to make the public see a side of Tesco that they never had before.

The only way to get people to believe in the quality of Finest was to get them to try it for themselves. But let's face it, a bit of in-store sampling wasn’t going to cut it.

So instead, we created Devour, the exhibition you can eat. A 6 course meal you could walk through.

6 rooms, 6 installations, inspired by 6 Tesco Finest products.

We invited the public to try it for themselves; to lick, smell and touch each installation, eating their way through the entire exhibition, from aperitif, to canapes, starters, mains, dessert and coffee. Discovering the unique story behind the food that inspired it.

Tesco Finest was the first ever premium supermarket own-brand in the UK, until new competitors emerged and knocked it off the top spot. Since then the public have stopped seeing Tesco as a premium supermarket brand and instead have come to see it as the supermarket known for great value.

The target audience were ‘foodies’. So anyone who had a passion for food. The strategy was to encourage this audience to rediscover the exceptional taste and quality of Tesco Finest. We knew that just telling them through a traditional campaign format wasn’t going to be enough, so instead we decided we needed them to try it for themselves.

As a taster, guests were invited to the media launch night through edible invitations.

Each installation was designed to tell the story of the product; where it was grown, how it was produced or what effect it had on the body. The installations considered lighting, colour, shapes, textures and sound design to fully immerse the viewer. To further enhance the experience we created specific sensorial elements. Edible ones, with champagne bubbles, edible fog and a rainbow you could walk through and taste. Audible ones, with a mushroom piano. Visual ones, with a mirror maze. And Stimulating ones, with a neon heart rate monitor that visualised the physical effects of the food.

Throughout, EEG headsets measured guests’ brain waves as they sampled the food. That data was collected and turned into personalised art, for a personal palate profile. At the end, guests could buy their favourite dishes in the gift shop.

Guests were left feeling completely differently about Tesco’s quality credentials, with 100% of attendees asked saying they were more likely to buy Tesco Finest having been to Devour.

The event itself exceeded social reach compared to previous campaigns by 44%.

Devour was featured in the press, with 27 articles written by major publications including BBC Good Food, The Daily Express, the Guardian, Stylist and Campaign.

Devour also contributed to Tesco’s best Christmas sales growth since 2009.