Dunkin’ was squeezed between Starbucks and McDonalds. They had doubled down on product experimentation, but the strategy hadn’t translated to sustained growth. Forgettable ads were forgotten, and traffic was on an 8 year decline.

Dunkin’ had to steal attention—and sales—from their competitors. To do that, they had to make a seismic impact on culture.

We built a Hollywood-style Cinematic Universe with multiple chapters, crazy characters, and a depth of content so entertaining, people sought it out on their own. And along the way, we built a real fandom.

While Dunkin’ is a national brand, its soul is found where it all began: Boston.

Boston has a character all its own, and it’s proud. It produced cultural touchstones like Cheers, The Departed, and dominant global sports brands like the Red Sox (MLB) and the Celtics (NBA). The accent is a beloved American icon.

Famous Bostonians are as proud of their Boston heritage as anyone. For some figures, Boston becomes a part of their public persona.

Such is the case for Ben Affleck. Ben’s global stardom has been rooted in his Boston upbringing since his breakout performance in Good Will Hunting, and he’s one of America’s true A-listers. He’s a two-time Oscar winner, a renowned performer and director, and he’s married to fellow A-lister Jennifer Lopez, who appears in the work.

He’s been photographed carrying Dunkin’ since the 90s. Known for his meme-inducing moments of ennui, a 2020 paparazzi photo captured the actor struggling to carry a large Dunkin’ order, prompting fans online to share widely, dubbing it a quintessential “Boston moment” and Ben a “relatable king.”

Ben and Dunkin’ shared the same Boston qualities: relatability, blunt honesty, enthusiasm, and a willingness to enjoy a joke, even if it may be at his own expense.

In this work he is joined by Matt Damon, childhood friend and Bostonian (famously the “normal” friend), and fellow A-list actor; as well as Tom Brady, 7x Super Bowl champion quarterback, 6x for Boston’s NFL team, the Patriots.

Dunkin’s advertising was on a marketing treadmill, messaging around constant menu updates. To no end—traffic was declining. And that traffic was going to Starbucks and McDonalds.

Dunkin’ did own traffic and attention in their historic home in the Northeast. 47% of adults in Boston order Dunkin’ at least once a month, and brand love is sky high.

But regional success hadn’t translated to national success. They were too reliant on their core loyalists: 43% of Dunkin’s total sales came from the Northeast, a region representing only 10% of the US population.

The challenge was extending that dominance to the rest of the country. Dunkin’ needed to raise their profile and drive awareness, positive sentiment, and, ultimately, sales.

Dunkin’ had to launch themselves over the heads of their competitors in the public conversation. And that meant creating an undeniable cultural moment that would put Dunkin’ on everyone’s radar.

We dug into the data and discovered that Dunkin’s largest sales opportunity, Infrequent and Lapsed purchasers, came for just three things: hot coffee, donuts, and iced coffee.

All those limited time offers weren’t building new use cases.

We also learned that these Infrequent customers had positive feelings about Dunkin’s brand. We’d lost relevance and top-of-mind awareness, but that sense of nostalgia and love remained.

It wasn’t that we had to reinvent the brand. It was that we had to reintroduce it, to use the brand’s core ID to activate the love that already existed, or spread that love to new people.

Often, the best way to do that is to elevate and dramatize a true believer. A savvy cultural observer would notice that there was one fan more loyal, and more entwined with Dunkin’, than the rest.

We made Ben Affleck, 50-something year old Bostonian and huge fan of Dunkin’, the Official Face of the Brand.

Over three chapters, the momentum around our “Dunkin’ Cinematic Universe” grew, as did people’s attachment to its main character: Ben, but More.

This Ben has more of a Boston accent, more pride in his love of Dunkin’, more desperation to seem relevant in front of young pop stars. In our final spot, Ben reveals his ultimate dedication to both his 90s nostalgia and his love of Dunkin: the retro-inspired “man-boy band”, The DunKings.

The self-referential, humorous core of the story helped drive billions in earned media.

And to land it, we knew what to commit to the bit just as hard as “Ben, but More” was committed to Dunkin’. We had to make the full 90s boy band tracksuits, the boy band choreography, and of course—the song.

In The DunKings, Ben Affleck is himself, but More. More Boston, more out of touch (so 90s), and more enthusiastic about Dunkin’. And chasing his boy band dreams.

Our task was to create an original composition that rode the line between humorous, retro-inspired, and a genuine bop. And to do it on a time crunch—we filmed in January, for a launch a month later during the Super Bowl.

So we worked with music producers The Kids are Lucky, a collective who’ve created hits for mainstream artists like Doja Cat and Drake. They worked synthy, cheesy, donut-pun-filled magic, and the track was completed the week before the spot was filmed.

Besides powering the hero moment where Ben busts into JLo’s studio to perform, the track has had a life on Spotify, and a lyric visualizer on YouTube, rounding out The DunKings’ presence in pop culture.

On St. Patrick’s Day, over a month after the original DunKings spot aired during the Super Bowl, the Governor of Massachusetts addressed a huge audience dressed in a DunKings tracksuit. With the Lt. Governor, she recited the spot word-for-word.

We saw kids perform the spot at talent shows, and little girls sing “Don’t Dunk Away at My Heart” to themselves at the dentist.

It’s fair to say, the spot (and the song) stuck.

All in, “The DunKings” surpassed all expectations, earning 40.4B impressions (more than Dunkin’ saw in all of 2022), 96% positive sentiment, and selling out merch in 19 minutes.

Across all three chapters of the Universe, Ben + Dunkin’ generated:

69.1 Billion Earned Impressions

+14pts brand awareness

+11pts consideration

+10.7% increase in sales

114k organic views on the YouTube official lyric video

Dunkin’ was clawing for relevancy in an ongoing attention-grabbing competition, and losing. The closest competition, Starbucks and McDonald’s, were globally recognized icons, who had built their market share through disciplined uniformity. A Starbucks anywhere looks like a Starbucks everywhere. Predictable, seamless—but a little soulless.

We had to forge our own path.

In this world of careful, curated branding, we had a real strength: the inimitable soul of Dunkin’. The every-man ethos, the hustle, and the slightly chaotic energy that came from their roots in the Northeast.

Throughout the campaign, we went all in on our very particular character, from our iconic brand ambassador, Ben Affleck, to his Boston accent, to the 90s deep cuts and the self-aware humor of Ben’s overblown Boston swagger.

We eschewed generality for specificity, and stood in stark contrast to the polish and corporatism of the competitors. And that enthusiastic authenticity is how we won.