Background & Context:

To resuscitate Brand Love, we turned to our ever-reliable brand advertising.

Traditionally these communications celebrated the emotional truths that surrounded our products – from pinching fries, to dipping them in milkshakes (yep, that's a thing).

But campaign diagnostics revealed an awkward truth: the nation’s relationship with this advertising was losing its spark - each campaign was getting less emotional (Source: IPSOS campaign tracking).

To complicate things further, new UK government legislation loomed large.

There had been ongoing public discussion about new rules for HFSS (High Fat, Salt & Sugar) product advertising. But now, the government had committed to banning advertising showing these products on broadcast channels before 9pm. Not only were our ads out of emotion – they were about to be defunct!

To re-ignite Brand Love (and, in turn, sales) we had to forge a new path – finding a new emotional role for the brand in people’s lives beyond the food.

A tall order for the nation’s most famous fast-food restaurant...

Insight:

In search of fresh insight we embarked on nearly a year of nation-wide ethnography research – immersing ourselves in customers’ lives – their homes, offices, bus-routes, even diaries.

Two unexpected insights emerged...

1. The most emotional part of a McDonald’s wasn’t its consumption – it was its suggestion.

When someone suggested a McDonald’s to another person it triggered an intense emotional reaction: from widening eyes, to mischievous smiles, to irrepressible bursts of excitement.

2. This suggestion was rarely spoken.

McDonald’s is so universal that when people made this cheeky suggestion, they didn’t have to say anything. Instead, these invitations came with a world of unspoken language – of subtle gestures, nods and looks.

Creative Challenge:

Find new emotion in our advertising by bringing to life the ‘The Unsaid Suggestion’ - bravely shifting our creative focus away from the food, the order, and even the restaurant.

Solution:

Between the unsaid nods, winks and knowing looks captured by research, we noticed one especially common signal.

It wasn’t just non-verbal – it was physical.

No lips moved – but something else did.

Something universal – but uniquely linked with the Golden Arches….

Idea:

‘Raise Your Arches’

We turned the mischievous eyebrow raise that often accompanies the ‘Unsaid Suggestion’ into a sticky branded behaviour that everyone could participate in.

Execution:

Three comms tasks helped embed the idea in culture:

1. Seed The Brows

We sparked mass hysteria ahead of launch by swapping the iconic Golden Arches logo for ‘Golden Eyebrows’ across owned channels.

2. Scale The Brows

We got the nation talking with a blockbuster film by Edgar Wright, and disruptive OOH that flooded streets with eyebrows.

3. Spread The Brows

We invited participation on social – creating a groundswell of eyebrows from an army of creators using our filter.

But it didn’t stop there.

Raise Your Arches inspired our Brand Love advertising for the rest of the year – with subsequent Summer and Christmas executions continuing to bring to life the joy of the ‘Unsaid Suggestion’.