OREO Calls is a mobile-led experience that turns referee calls into calls for OREO, all during the most popular basketball event in the US - March Madness. By reimagining referee signals as playful cookie match-ups, Oreo invited fans to scan to unlock offers on all kinds of Oreo products based on the referee signals.

A promotional effort that not only boosted sales nationwide but put Oreo in the game for every second of the final 7 games of the tournament, managing to increase brand awareness while driving incremental sales.

Few sporting events, regardless of professional level, bring the elevated attention from spectators and brands that is afforded to the NCAA March Madness Tournament. Spanning a single month, the tournament has reached unofficial holiday status for many, bringing roughly 13 hours of basketball content daily and resulting in over 170 million fans watching an average of 348 minutes per viewer.

Its single-elimination format makes every game a must-win, contributing to the tournament’s drama, excitement, and unpredictability. The office pools and watch parties it inspires have become a cultural tradition, and its significance as a shared experience for people across the country was especially meaningful at a time in U.S. culture that’s rife with polarized views and experiences on many other issues and topics.

In short, March Madness was the ultimate in rich cultural moments this year – perfect for a brand continually seeking new ways to stay relevant and exciting within the cultural conversation. It’s also a key drive period for many retailers since snacking associations with college hoops are so strong.

Family-friendly Walmart, in particular, prizes March Madness as a tournament with broad family and friend appeal, and we knew Walmart was likely to reward OREO with incremental quality merchandising display if the brand could put a fresh and exciting spin on the retailer’s March Madness drive period.

OREO unit sales were down versus year ago when we began planning for this campaign, and we saw March Madness not only as a prime opportunity to recruit more NCAA fans to our brand (a household penetration objective), but also to drive buy-rate among those who like OREO Cookies but weren’t making them a regular part of their March snacking basket. The 67 games in the tournament represented a big opportunity to drive frequency of OREO purchase, in particular – but how?

OREO had successfully played off matchups of its cookie-creme layers with black-white imagery in the past. This time: drive penetration and buy rate for OREO by playfully finding ways to turn college basketball fans’ everyday viewing during March Madness into an association with OREO Cookies.

We realized that the OREO brand’s black cookie and white creme layers were already naturally part of college basketball games, hiding in plain sight on referees’ black-and-white striped uniforms at courtside. So, we playfully hacked the March Madness game play by creating a rich mobile-commerce experience that invited sports fans to scan real-time officiated calls throughout the tournament and score sweet deals on OREO Cookies.

Different referee signals were converted into real-time playful cookie matchups in an easy-to-access web experience, each combined with an OREO offer redeemable at Walmart stores nationwide. The “OREO Calls” gave fans a moment of fun during the whole game – with social media and other channels driving viewers to visit Oreocalls.com in these moments and sparking conversation about referees’ calls and the corresponding playful OREO calls and offers.

March Madness fans are drawn to the drama of a tournament in which every game is a must-win — with viewing so fun and intense that when the ball isn’t in play, there’s a feeling of let down.

Leading to our insight: Game interruptions take away from the excitement integral to the experience.

Key message: When game play stops, OREO keeps the playfulness going – giving fans a chance to scan real-time officiated calls and convert them into an OREO Cookie call.

Our audience for this PR effort: Sports journalists, commentators, and college basketball fans nationwide with a sweet tooth and sense of playfulness — especially social media-savvy Gen Zers amplifying our message with their own posts.

We began with outreach from the OREO social handle on X, driving online excitement to view the weekend’s games, followed by hyper targeted media alongside a final push to publications.

We began with social outreach across X, directly from the OREO brand handle to drive excitement among cookie lovers that this unique OREO experience would be live for the Elite Eight weekend.

On Saturday 3/31, we had a massive digital media push. Custom built audiences reached OREO lovers, basketball enthusiasts and Walmart fans across the country, reaching them with in-moment push notifications, social media banners across Meta platforms and custom digital display media.

We reached millions of cookie and basketball fans throughout the weekend of 3/30 – 3/31 and 4/7-- 4/8, driving them to engage with the custom OREOCalls.com experience and turn those referee jerseys into OREO Cookies!

OREO Calls was a short-time high-impact program generating during the 2 weeks and 8 matches it was live an average +100k live scans per game.

OREO Coupons added to digital wallet saw a successful redemption rate of 61% at Walmart (Partnering retailer)

Oreo Calls reversed the YoY declining trend for Oreo driving +9.8% direct sales vs PY March Madness launch week.

In a flat cookie category, OREO Calls resulted in a +9.7% increase in category share.

March Madness is a cultural juggernaut, even if you’re not a fan!

Brands pay millions to be associated with these games – and OREO hacked into it by creating playful opportunities to score cookies. Our iconic black-and-white brand equity is already naturally part of the college basketball tournament’s games, hidden in plain sight on referees’ striped uniforms at courtside. And through a rich mobile-commerce experience, sports fans were able to scan real-time officiated calls and convert them into a call for cookies – a clever way to harness the excitement around March Madness and connect it to the OREO brand.