June 21, 2023 • 23 mins
Fun fact: When you eat those amazing Cheetos, you’re left with a tasty souvenir: the orange dust on your fingers, which actually has a name: Cheetle. This episode is a conversation with two of the creative minds behind the award winning Cheetle in Cheadle campaign, Jess Spaulding, CMO at PepsiCo Foods Canada and Josh Budd, Chief Creative Officer at Citizen Relations.
In this conversation, Josh and Jess give us a peek behind the curtain and share all about how the Cheetle statue came to life and quickly became a viral sensation, attracting thousands of fans from all over. This award winning campaign generated significant coverage, and became a global phenomenon.
We discuss how their unique approach to this campaign allowed them to stand out from a crowded marketing field on this episode of Partners in Possibility.
Check Out The Cheetle in Cheadle:
- Sizzle reel: https://youtu.be/_aTOhzld1V0
- Cheeto’s Press Release:
https://www.fritolay.com/cheetos%C2%AE-proudly-unveils-a-statue-to-commemorate-cheetle-the-official-term-for-the-brands-orange-dust
-Jimmy Kimmel & Don Cheadle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82dyXsYsaPs
from plus company
In this conversation, Josh and Jess give us a peek behind the curtain and share all about how the Cheetle statue came to life and quickly became a viral sensation, attracting thousands of fans from all over. This award winning campaign generated significant coverage, and became a global phenomenon.
We discuss how their unique approach to this campaign allowed them to stand out from a crowded marketing field on this episode of Partners in Possibility.
Check Out The Cheetle in Cheadle:
- Sizzle reel: https://youtu.be/_aTOhzld1V0
- Cheeto’s Press Release:
https://www.fritolay.com/cheetos%C2%AE-proudly-unveils-a-statue-to-commemorate-cheetle-the-official-term-for-the-brands-orange-dust
-Jimmy Kimmel & Don Cheadle:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82dyXsYsaPs
from plus company
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
We did think about the Cheetle trinityof Don Cheel, the Cheetle statue and
chet but it was a bit ofa moonshot to be honest. And again,
you know, sometimes I think asCanadian marketers we need to give ourselves
permission to dream that someone like AcademyAward Don Cheeto would actually interact in an
(00:26):
ever changing world. That's all aboutstained connected, building connections and seeing where
the next collaboration takes a marketing campaignfrom an initial brief to the follow through.
What paths are going to make acampaign success more than a possibility?
Hi, I'm Brett Marsharn, CEOof Plus Company, This Partners and Possibility.
(00:49):
Here's a fun fact. You knowwhen you eat Cheetos and you get
that orange dust on your fingers,Well, that dust actually has a name,
Cheetle. So when Cheetos discovered asmall albert village called Cheatle, they
saw an opportunity to connect with thetwo. Today on the show, I
speak with Jess Balding, CMO andPepsiCo Canada and Josh Budd, Chief Creative
(01:10):
Officer and Citizen Relations. Together theylaunched the Cheatle in Cheatle campaign, a
seventeen foot tall monument to the Cheetospuff at its famous orange dust. Might
have seen it on the news oron Jimmy Kimmel, because the statue quickly
became a viral sensation, attracting thousandsof fans from all over and making the
(01:30):
campaign a global phenomena. Today,we talk about how the campaign came to
be, the strategies behind the viralmarketing, and the impact it had on
the brand. Here's my conversation withJess and Josh. Let's start with the
objective before we actually talk about whatthe campaign was. So what were you
(01:53):
trying to achieve with this? Jess, Yeah, absolutely. You know,
it's funny to even call this acampaign, I think at times, because
it was a bit more of likejust a bold act. And the objective
of that was really, you know, Cheetos in Canada is known for so
many distinct assets, whether it's um, you know, our spokesperson Chester,
the like bright orange bag and product. But we knew that, you know,
(02:16):
we wanted to make sure that wereally unleashed the power in the fandom
that we know that this brand hasin Canada, and so we felt like
we had to do something different,had to do something bold and really equate
you know, some of the assetsof Um, the you know, the
cheesiness and the irresistibility and the mischievonous into something that was physical. And
(02:39):
so this this brief was really setout to try to make a statement of
connecting the idea of the cheetle,which is the orange dust like it's left
on your hands, the delicious umCheetle many times right with um, with
the brand, and and really speakto a new audience and really be in
(03:01):
service of our fans of the brand. So it was really kind of what
we set out and set out todo. Josh, maybe maybe just talk
about the idea a little bit,because I think you've teased it here.
That's you know, cheatle on yourfingers in Cheatle, but for our audience,
maybe just describe exactly what you did. Sure, okay. So the
ask from the PepsiCo Canada Cheeto's teamwas not to advertise the brand and not
(03:27):
to communicate the product, but tocommunicate this relationship I guess between the experience
and the product. And again IJess mentioned it's to cheat ale on your
fingers, And so the brief was, how can we get this out into
the world. How can we getpeople to celebrate this polarizing experience with the
brand And the fact that it waspolarizing was something that we decided to lean
(03:50):
into because that means people care aboutit. So the job was to get
more people to celebrate it. Andso then we started to look at,
Okay, well, how do youcelebrate the things you love? You know,
you buy pictures of it, youput it on the wall, and
then you start walking around the city. It's like, oh, when we
really revere something, we build amonument to it. So how mischievous would
it be to build a monument tothis to cheatle And so of course it
(04:14):
had to have the hand, ithad to have the product itself. And
so we kind of went through lookingat statues and really like making it look
like kind of graphic and iconic andlike it was carved out of stone kind
of thing with the orange popping toreally bring it back to the brand.
And then we looked at where wecould put it, and that's where the
(04:35):
kind of genius of the creative team, Sure Marley, came into places.
They found this little hamlet in Albertaof eighty three, about nineties minutes I
think from Calgary called Cheatle spelt differentlybut called Cheal. And so when they
showed it to us, they're like, we're gonna put the Cheatle statue and
Cheatle Alberta. It was like check, that makes a ton of sense,
(04:56):
super clever and you know, fromthe PR space really easy to see the
headline that comes out of that.So we felt like we were kind of
cooking with gas there. And thenonce we started to look at Alberta and
it is kind of like the Canadiancapital for oversized food landmarks, which as
you know, I think we werechatting earlier about, like you have some
experience with that. I grew upin Alberta. By the way. There's
(05:17):
a lot of small towns in Albertathat are famous for having giant statues of
food. The first I think ofwhich is a huge Ukrainian Easter egg,
which I told these guys the storythat I used to when I was a
kid. We would drive to Saskatoonfrom Edmonton every year and my parents would
make us stop and you know,the see the giant Easter egg. But
(05:40):
but the funny part about that isthat, I mean we didn't really want
to stop, at least after thefirst time, but now with Instagram online
social media. I mean it's actuallya perfect idea. Right. So you've
got this giant hand, it's gota statue of a hand, it's got
the actual Cheatle on the fingers.It's in China, Alberta. By the
way, probably helpful that it speltCheatle the same way as Don Cheatle,
(06:01):
because it actually got it on thestatue on Kimmel and a bunch of other
things, right, because of thatmuch was amazing. I'm not sure did
you think about that, Josh whenit did her I guess, I guess
that's probably just luck. No,well, no, we did think about
the Cheatle trinity of Don Cheat Cheatlestatue in Cheetle, Alberta. But it
was a bit of a moonshot,to be honest. And again, you
(06:23):
know, sometimes I think as Canadianmarketers, we need to give ourselves permission
to dream that someone like you know, war Machine, Don Cheatle, Academy
Award Don Cheetle would actually interact andlo and behold, Jimmy Kimmel kind of
broke herd that for us. AndI think that again, that's a testament
to the cultural residence of the productand the execution that truly and earned fashion,
(06:46):
no brand integration, no paid partnership. It showed up on Jimmy Kimmel
while he was interviewing Don Cheatle.Jimmy offered to build a replica on Don
Cheatle's property, and then they bothchanged Don Cheatle's Wikipedia told Don che standing
in front of the statue, ifeven the Wikipedia now you can feed Don
chet still with the statue behind it, pretty awesome. Just goes to show
(07:09):
the power of earned media, rightbecause I don't think there was a lot
of media dollars spent against it.Yeah, it's gotten millions and if not
billions, Yeah, I think itwas a five K media investment. There
was one sponsored article, yep,and I think when we did the math
it was like sixty three million inmedia equivalence or something like that. Wow.
Yeah, you know, everyone hopestheir marketing campaigns go viral, but
(07:34):
not everyone can pull it off.Besides the fact that Cheetos, as an
iconic snack item created more than halfa century ago, has the advantage of
years and years of brand recognition,the team at Citizen Relations had a simple
but labor intensive strategy in place asingle paid article and a hard working pr
team to support it. So obviouslypeople are showing up in cheatle there in
(08:00):
photos of themselves, they're doing Instagramposts, etc. But then I presume
it got billions of impressions with somehelp from the Citizen team, etc.
I'm interested in in what you didthere. Yeah, So I mean the
strategy very much was let's erect it, let's put one targeted kind of regional
paid sponsorship article. But then itwas a bit of like let's open a
(08:22):
bag of Cheetos and cross our fingersand hope that people start to come.
Because then the next phase of theearn strategy was once we start to get
some grounds, well, use thatto pitch media. Use that to pitch
local media. Local media gives itattention, was gets the attention to national
media. And you know, theCitizen team did a really good job,
Like it was amazing to see themlike spring into action. Like when something
(08:43):
happened, the team went and thenpitched this type this tier media. When
that kicked the box, they movedand moved on two different kind of tiers
of media and different strategies until tobe honest, it kind of took on
a life of its own, right, like once CNN Austria and India start
calling, like those aren't organizations thatwe reached out to, they were now
(09:05):
coming to Citizen and to PEPSI andtalking about the campaign. So it did
kind of you know, to usethe word viral. Ultimately, that's how
it happened, but it was strategicallyorganized to go viral out of the gate.
Yeah, I think I don't thinkpeople realize how much work there is
in media relations right because you know, it doesn't I mean, sometimes it
(09:26):
just happens, but so rarely.I mean, Jess, you must know.
Yeah, absolutely. I mean I'msuch a believer in the lever of
PR as part of your overall mixfor for brand building, and I think
when you have iconic brands and culture, how do you harness that love to
get that amplification of what you're alreadydoing. You know, there was a
(09:48):
lot of ads we could have ran. There was a huge campaign we could
have followed from the US, andwe were a little bit like MS Canada,
ready to go all the way tokind of this re ridiculous, mischievous
positioning. And that's a bit morein service of you know, kind of
a younger demographic and really celebrate thefandom that exists, and we didn't know
(10:09):
how much fandom was fully going tofollow us there. And so I think
that's, you know, credit tothe work that Citizen did is it was
just a really brilliantly simple idea toget this thought across, but it allowed
the consumers to really take it,take it on and and showcase it to
(10:33):
other people as almost something they discoveredversus you know, receiving an ad and
so I think that's what made itso so unique. I know when we
talked about this initially internally you werelike, does it need a big logo?
Everyone need to know? And youknow, with your team's guidance,
we all had trust that this notionof a handling the cheetah and the cheetah
(10:54):
was iconic enough and like, notmany brands can do that. Not many
brands have the cachet to be ableto go out with something like that unbranded
and get instant kind of credit creditfor it. Yeah. Yeah, I
mean, huge kudos to the tothe team, Lisa and Carolyn and Shawna,
because I think you know, initiallysome of the ideas that we were
kicking around had Chester involved and itwas a little bit more down the middle
(11:18):
or expected, and this brand isanything but that you need to be kind
of ridiculous, um and mischievous,and so that's where, you know,
creatively, we ended up on somethingthat was a bit more out there and
definitely less branded. And we dolive in the world right where whether it's
a digital lad or broadcast dad,there's best practice if the logo has to
show up in this right. Sothis is really a real departure from that,
(11:39):
absolutely, and I hope the teststhat that paid off in terms of
like when we think down the road, but how we brand absolutely giving some
credit to the consumer and things likethat. Yeah, yeah, absolutely,
So I mean what actually happened whenwhen when we put the statue up,
I presume lots of people took pictures. Yeah, I mean I think initially
it was literally on a far landessentially, so there wasn't signs pointing to
(12:01):
it. There wasn't you know,we've had kind of that one sponsored article,
but there wasn't any other, youknow, information, so that you
saw kind of a slow build ofthan just kind of this explosion of momentum,
which as a marketer's a dream forsomething to go you know, viral,
which is a word that we loatheand is not ever in a brief
(12:22):
but you kind of just hope thatmaybe you know, something will catch,
um, catch the attention of ofyour fans. And you know, when
you have a brand that's so embeddedin the flow of culture and you have
people who are so passionate about it, um, it kind of, you
know, organically happens. And soI think initially it was you know,
a few people here and there,and then by the end it was thousands
(12:43):
of people a day. Yeah,thousands a day a day. We kept
getting messages from our our contact therebeing like, yeah, there's a few
people here to say, oh,there's a thousand people here, and they
definitely uge the tenor of this hamletof eighty three people to be really like,
you know, kind of there arefifteen minutes of fame, so to
(13:07):
speaking, in Albertia, which atone point they're like, is this going
to last forever? Will we juststart to have thousand people a day?
So I think the temporary nature ofthe statue played into a bit of like
a bit of a good moment forthem, but then let them get back
to their their regular days. Butit was it was crazy yea, And
some of the subtleties that you justtalked about, Jess, I think we're
(13:28):
probably important and um well not probablyclearly important to the success of the campaign,
not sort of making a loud bang, as Josh said, not having
a logo on it, you know, and branding, not putting Chester nearby,
etc. Yeah. I think hadwe had a monster budget and some
you know, grand tent pole moment, we probably would have screwed it up
(13:50):
a little bit, right. Andso I think sometimes like there's just beauty
and simplicity of an idea, andthat's I mean, we talk about a
lot of you know, what isthe like true all of the idea?
How do you do that you knowas well as you can and kind of
remove the excess And so, youknow, this really was about generating awareness
that you know, the name ofthe orange stuff on your fingers is called
(14:13):
cheatle like that was that was it? Right? And so when you bring
Chester in, that does a differentstory. When you bring you know,
the logo in, that's a differentstory. This truly was something that you
couldn't really ignore. And then whenwe had you know, these fans kind
of show up in droves, theytook over, they built a Wikipedia page
for it, they did all theseTikTok um you know videos and social social
(14:39):
videos, and you know, theythey shared it organically and that's kind of
lightning in a bottle a little bit. And you know when I think it
doesn't come from the brand so avertlyit is something that people can claim as
their own. And this is abrand that fans have claimed as their own.
And so you know, how dowe do more things that are in
service of that? Yeah? Yeah, I think this brand is at its
(15:00):
best when it shows up very seriousabout whatever context it's in, because that's
the tension and juxtaposition of how ridiculousit is. Right. You know,
we've seen that with this brand globally. We've seen in the US and we're
just now, I think, startinginto that in Canada. But you know,
whether it's technology that the cheatle youknow, has a role in,
(15:26):
whether it's you know, getting youout of you know, tough situations that
you don't want to be a partof, or it's being part of a
culture of gigantic roadside statues. Ithink, you know, what we believe
about this brand is that you haveto kind of be committed and then let
the brand be the kind of lightnessto the idea, and I think that
(15:46):
the team did an amazing job ofbringing that to life. I don't know
if Cheatle has ever helped you getout of any tough situations, maybe avoiding
a phone call or helping with achore, regardless it's a problem or a
solution we've all experienced. We're goingto take a quick break and when we
come back, Jess and Josh discussthe impacts of the Cheatle and Cheatle campaign.
(16:21):
Welcome back to Partners Impossibility. I'mBrett Marshan. We know people arrived
at the small town of Cheatle inAlberta, Canada, population eighty three by
the thousands to get a look atthe Cheatle and Cheatle statue. And we
know that the original media budget wasonly five thousand dollars. But what was
the overall impact of this viral campaignand how was it perceived not only by
(16:44):
customers but by the marketing world.Listen, I want to talk a little
bit about all these international awards wetalked about upfront, because I think it's
you know, sort of awards showseason, right, Josh, and maybe
give us the highlights because there's youknow, if you listen them all,
I think it's going to take therisk of the podcast. So it's a
problem we're very flattered to have,that's for sure. Yeah, it is
(17:07):
like human today, and I thinkyou told me about three more of on
that are happening, so it's adaily occurrence. It's pretty exciting. Yeah,
I mean, it's amazing to seeCanada showing up on the on the
global stage and in a way thatlike it's probably leading even the US team
in terms of like this type ofactivity, and you know, we're getting
we've gotten trophies and attention from allthe kind of big international shows both in
(17:33):
the PR world like PR Week andUH and the Savers, but also like
one show Cleo's DNA D things likethat. But what justin I was just
talking earlier, like what's really interestingis it it's not just getting recognized in
like a PR stream, but it'sit's really getting recognized in out of home,
in brand experience and activation, inregional effectiveness, return on budget,
(17:56):
you know, overcoming challenges things likethat, which you know, I think
is really interesting and credit to theproject. Yeah, No, absolutely,
I mean I think it's it's it'sso exciting for the industry to acknowledge the
work. But I also think ithelps. What I'm the most proud of
is there is amazing creative work happeningin Canada, like outstanding innovation and creativity.
(18:19):
And I think that we have somebeautiful brands with PepsiCo Foods Canada and
Cheetos is one of many. Andlisten, I talked to a lot of
clients often, and I used tobe a client for a long time,
who say that awards don't matter andthey're not the all inhend all, let's
be honest. But you know,I always say that to marketers. Well,
(18:40):
if your campaigns aren't winning in internationalshows, that means they are not
standing out against a whole bunch ofother work, which means they are not
standing out in a very very crowdedmedia social media online market right now,
which means they're not kind of noticed. So you know, if you win,
you win the kinds of awards thatthis campaign's winning, it means that
(19:00):
people are recognizing it and it's standingout, which is god. It helps
you know, the brand and salesand a bunch of other things. Yeah,
you know, I mean I thinkit's a tricky one, right that
you never kind of set out towin an award, and I think if
if that had been the brief,we wouldn't have gotten to such a strong
idea. Um. And so youknow, it's always, I think a
little bit of a shared ambition togetheras a client and an agency partner to
(19:25):
have the work recognized and celebrated.But it has to come along with a
lot of other things. And whatI've noticed and Cheetos has been you know,
well awarded the original Cheatles strategy,one that Grand Prix and can for
creative strategy, and it's one youknow can Lions, it's one Cleo's in
the US. And so what wasso exciting for me is, um,
(19:48):
this I think is really putting puttingCanada on the map for you know,
how can we continue the narrative butin a way that's uniquely Canadian And I
think the cheatle and Cheatle and reallyleaning into Canadian culture in Alberta in such
a fun way is exactly how we'regoing to continue to do that. Let's
talk about the other measures of success. So I'm sure there were other things
(20:10):
that were important, Jess in thiscampaign, besides what we just talked about
an awards, So how did youmeasure the success of this? Yeah?
So, I mean the primary KPIwas, you know, will people associate
the word cheatle with the dust that'sthe delicious dust that's on your hands.
I think that's a check. Um. So I think we've gotten Canada and
(20:32):
beyond to talk about it, whichis super exciting. And then you know,
obviously we always believe that great workcan drive business that you are not
incongruent, and so when you havework that is so effective, it starts
to have people reconsider the brand orconsider the brand for more occasions. And
so we saw a tremendous amount ofgrowth on the brand. And it was
(20:55):
super interesting because when we looked atthe data, and we're able to look
at the data to pretty you know, micro level. We started to look
at the stores around Cheetah, Albertasold out of puffs. If you go
and you kept coin rings and ringsand rings out, you could not buy
a bag of these these puffs.And it was because people were buying them
to take pictures so they would holdit right with the bag and the statue.
(21:21):
Um. But what we thought,maybe it would stay local. But
what we saw the brand is absolutelyon fire. And so it's it's double
digit growth, which we haven't seenon the brand UM in quite some time.
And for a brand of this scale, you know, it's it's pretty
incredible for to have such an impactthe statue. Where does the statue go
next? Any We've had a lotof demand for the statue actually, and
(21:45):
we created a couple versions. Therewas one that was, you know,
meant to go to mister Cheadle.I think a lot of people think we
paid for that placement on on JimmyKimmel with the media landscape being so kind
of complicated, but that was allyou know, organic and earned UM.
And so you know, I thinkI think Don had a small reconsideration of
a seventeen foot statue in his frontyard. UM. And that plus the
(22:11):
thousands of people who would show upevery day to take correct I think he
I think maybe that was more itwas just safe run as a Wikipedia page
UM. But we decided to giftit to our US headquarters in Plano,
Texas. UM. It's a littlebit like a statue of liberty gift from
Canada to our US counterpart. Soit'll be uh, it'll live down there,
(22:32):
and then we'll have some that travelaround as well, and we'll have
one headquarters up here in Toronto aswell. But I think it's just a
start, right. Yeah, there'sa lot, a lot of places we
can take. You never know whereit's going to show up, So keep
your eye out for a statue.Geez, I wonder where next. Um,
thanks a lot for this is agreat campaign. I mean, it
is a great example by the way, in partners and possibility. You know,
(22:55):
it takes a break market or witha with a with a good idea
and a simple, simple brief inthe first place, like you talked about,
Jess, and you know, ittakes a really creative thinking and some
bravery to push push it out.And I just think this is such a
great example, and I'm with you. I you know, I hope this
puts Canada even more on the stageon the creative side of things. I'm
sure with your help Jess as well. So thanks very much for doing this,
(23:17):
and congratulations on all you have achieved. Thank you, Thank you for
having us, Brett, Thank youBrot. That was my discussion with Jess
baldin CMO at PepsiCo, Canada,and Josh Budd, chief creative officer at
Citizen Relations. Thank you for listeningto partners and Possibility. I hope you
gained valuable insights and inspiration for yournext collaboration.
We did think about the Cheetle trinityof Don Cheel, the Cheetle statue and
chet but it was a bit ofa moonshot to be honest. And again,
you know, sometimes I think asCanadian marketers we need to give ourselves
permission to dream that someone like AcademyAward Don Cheeto would actually interact in an
(00:26):
ever changing world. That's all aboutstained connected, building connections and seeing where
the next collaboration takes a marketing campaignfrom an initial brief to the follow through.
What paths are going to make acampaign success more than a possibility?
Hi, I'm Brett Marsharn, CEOof Plus Company, This Partners and Possibility.
(00:49):
Here's a fun fact. You knowwhen you eat Cheetos and you get
that orange dust on your fingers,Well, that dust actually has a name,
Cheetle. So when Cheetos discovered asmall albert village called Cheatle, they
saw an opportunity to connect with thetwo. Today on the show, I
speak with Jess Balding, CMO andPepsiCo Canada and Josh Budd, Chief Creative
(01:10):
Officer and Citizen Relations. Together theylaunched the Cheatle in Cheatle campaign, a
seventeen foot tall monument to the Cheetospuff at its famous orange dust. Might
have seen it on the news oron Jimmy Kimmel, because the statue quickly
became a viral sensation, attracting thousandsof fans from all over and making the
(01:30):
campaign a global phenomena. Today,we talk about how the campaign came to
be, the strategies behind the viralmarketing, and the impact it had on
the brand. Here's my conversation withJess and Josh. Let's start with the
objective before we actually talk about whatthe campaign was. So what were you
(01:53):
trying to achieve with this? Jess, Yeah, absolutely. You know,
it's funny to even call this acampaign, I think at times, because
it was a bit more of likejust a bold act. And the objective
of that was really, you know, Cheetos in Canada is known for so
many distinct assets, whether it's um, you know, our spokesperson Chester,
the like bright orange bag and product. But we knew that, you know,
(02:16):
we wanted to make sure that wereally unleashed the power in the fandom
that we know that this brand hasin Canada, and so we felt like
we had to do something different,had to do something bold and really equate
you know, some of the assetsof Um, the you know, the
cheesiness and the irresistibility and the mischievonous into something that was physical. And
(02:39):
so this this brief was really setout to try to make a statement of
connecting the idea of the cheetle,which is the orange dust like it's left
on your hands, the delicious umCheetle many times right with um, with
the brand, and and really speakto a new audience and really be in
(03:01):
service of our fans of the brand. So it was really kind of what
we set out and set out todo. Josh, maybe maybe just talk
about the idea a little bit,because I think you've teased it here.
That's you know, cheatle on yourfingers in Cheatle, but for our audience,
maybe just describe exactly what you did. Sure, okay. So the
ask from the PepsiCo Canada Cheeto's teamwas not to advertise the brand and not
(03:27):
to communicate the product, but tocommunicate this relationship I guess between the experience
and the product. And again IJess mentioned it's to cheat ale on your
fingers, And so the brief was, how can we get this out into
the world. How can we getpeople to celebrate this polarizing experience with the
brand And the fact that it waspolarizing was something that we decided to lean
(03:50):
into because that means people care aboutit. So the job was to get
more people to celebrate it. Andso then we started to look at,
Okay, well, how do youcelebrate the things you love? You know,
you buy pictures of it, youput it on the wall, and
then you start walking around the city. It's like, oh, when we
really revere something, we build amonument to it. So how mischievous would
it be to build a monument tothis to cheatle And so of course it
(04:14):
had to have the hand, ithad to have the product itself. And
so we kind of went through lookingat statues and really like making it look
like kind of graphic and iconic andlike it was carved out of stone kind
of thing with the orange popping toreally bring it back to the brand.
And then we looked at where wecould put it, and that's where the
(04:35):
kind of genius of the creative team, Sure Marley, came into places.
They found this little hamlet in Albertaof eighty three, about nineties minutes I
think from Calgary called Cheatle spelt differentlybut called Cheal. And so when they
showed it to us, they're like, we're gonna put the Cheatle statue and
Cheatle Alberta. It was like check, that makes a ton of sense,
(04:56):
super clever and you know, fromthe PR space really easy to see the
headline that comes out of that.So we felt like we were kind of
cooking with gas there. And thenonce we started to look at Alberta and
it is kind of like the Canadiancapital for oversized food landmarks, which as
you know, I think we werechatting earlier about, like you have some
experience with that. I grew upin Alberta. By the way. There's
(05:17):
a lot of small towns in Albertathat are famous for having giant statues of
food. The first I think ofwhich is a huge Ukrainian Easter egg,
which I told these guys the storythat I used to when I was a
kid. We would drive to Saskatoonfrom Edmonton every year and my parents would
make us stop and you know,the see the giant Easter egg. But
(05:40):
but the funny part about that isthat, I mean we didn't really want
to stop, at least after thefirst time, but now with Instagram online
social media. I mean it's actuallya perfect idea. Right. So you've
got this giant hand, it's gota statue of a hand, it's got
the actual Cheatle on the fingers.It's in China, Alberta. By the
way, probably helpful that it speltCheatle the same way as Don Cheatle,
(06:01):
because it actually got it on thestatue on Kimmel and a bunch of other
things, right, because of thatmuch was amazing. I'm not sure did
you think about that, Josh whenit did her I guess, I guess
that's probably just luck. No,well, no, we did think about
the Cheatle trinity of Don Cheat Cheatlestatue in Cheetle, Alberta. But it
was a bit of a moonshot,to be honest. And again, you
(06:23):
know, sometimes I think as Canadianmarketers, we need to give ourselves permission
to dream that someone like you know, war Machine, Don Cheatle, Academy
Award Don Cheetle would actually interact andlo and behold, Jimmy Kimmel kind of
broke herd that for us. AndI think that again, that's a testament
to the cultural residence of the productand the execution that truly and earned fashion,
(06:46):
no brand integration, no paid partnership. It showed up on Jimmy Kimmel
while he was interviewing Don Cheatle.Jimmy offered to build a replica on Don
Cheatle's property, and then they bothchanged Don Cheatle's Wikipedia told Don che standing
in front of the statue, ifeven the Wikipedia now you can feed Don
chet still with the statue behind it, pretty awesome. Just goes to show
(07:09):
the power of earned media, rightbecause I don't think there was a lot
of media dollars spent against it.Yeah, it's gotten millions and if not
billions, Yeah, I think itwas a five K media investment. There
was one sponsored article, yep,and I think when we did the math
it was like sixty three million inmedia equivalence or something like that. Wow.
Yeah, you know, everyone hopestheir marketing campaigns go viral, but
(07:34):
not everyone can pull it off.Besides the fact that Cheetos, as an
iconic snack item created more than halfa century ago, has the advantage of
years and years of brand recognition,the team at Citizen Relations had a simple
but labor intensive strategy in place asingle paid article and a hard working pr
team to support it. So obviouslypeople are showing up in cheatle there in
(08:00):
photos of themselves, they're doing Instagramposts, etc. But then I presume
it got billions of impressions with somehelp from the Citizen team, etc.
I'm interested in in what you didthere. Yeah, So I mean the
strategy very much was let's erect it, let's put one targeted kind of regional
paid sponsorship article. But then itwas a bit of like let's open a
(08:22):
bag of Cheetos and cross our fingersand hope that people start to come.
Because then the next phase of theearn strategy was once we start to get
some grounds, well, use thatto pitch media. Use that to pitch
local media. Local media gives itattention, was gets the attention to national
media. And you know, theCitizen team did a really good job,
Like it was amazing to see themlike spring into action. Like when something
(08:43):
happened, the team went and thenpitched this type this tier media. When
that kicked the box, they movedand moved on two different kind of tiers
of media and different strategies until tobe honest, it kind of took on
a life of its own, right, like once CNN Austria and India start
calling, like those aren't organizations thatwe reached out to, they were now
(09:05):
coming to Citizen and to PEPSI andtalking about the campaign. So it did
kind of you know, to usethe word viral. Ultimately, that's how
it happened, but it was strategicallyorganized to go viral out of the gate.
Yeah, I think I don't thinkpeople realize how much work there is
in media relations right because you know, it doesn't I mean, sometimes it
(09:26):
just happens, but so rarely.I mean, Jess, you must know.
Yeah, absolutely. I mean I'msuch a believer in the lever of
PR as part of your overall mixfor for brand building, and I think
when you have iconic brands and culture, how do you harness that love to
get that amplification of what you're alreadydoing. You know, there was a
(09:48):
lot of ads we could have ran. There was a huge campaign we could
have followed from the US, andwe were a little bit like MS Canada,
ready to go all the way tokind of this re ridiculous, mischievous
positioning. And that's a bit morein service of you know, kind of
a younger demographic and really celebrate thefandom that exists, and we didn't know
(10:09):
how much fandom was fully going tofollow us there. And so I think
that's, you know, credit tothe work that Citizen did is it was
just a really brilliantly simple idea toget this thought across, but it allowed
the consumers to really take it,take it on and and showcase it to
(10:33):
other people as almost something they discoveredversus you know, receiving an ad and
so I think that's what made itso so unique. I know when we
talked about this initially internally you werelike, does it need a big logo?
Everyone need to know? And youknow, with your team's guidance,
we all had trust that this notionof a handling the cheetah and the cheetah
(10:54):
was iconic enough and like, notmany brands can do that. Not many
brands have the cachet to be ableto go out with something like that unbranded
and get instant kind of credit creditfor it. Yeah. Yeah, I
mean, huge kudos to the tothe team, Lisa and Carolyn and Shawna,
because I think you know, initiallysome of the ideas that we were
kicking around had Chester involved and itwas a little bit more down the middle
(11:18):
or expected, and this brand isanything but that you need to be kind
of ridiculous, um and mischievous,and so that's where, you know,
creatively, we ended up on somethingthat was a bit more out there and
definitely less branded. And we dolive in the world right where whether it's
a digital lad or broadcast dad,there's best practice if the logo has to
show up in this right. Sothis is really a real departure from that,
(11:39):
absolutely, and I hope the teststhat that paid off in terms of
like when we think down the road, but how we brand absolutely giving some
credit to the consumer and things likethat. Yeah, yeah, absolutely,
So I mean what actually happened whenwhen when we put the statue up,
I presume lots of people took pictures. Yeah, I mean I think initially
it was literally on a far landessentially, so there wasn't signs pointing to
(12:01):
it. There wasn't you know,we've had kind of that one sponsored article,
but there wasn't any other, youknow, information, so that you
saw kind of a slow build ofthan just kind of this explosion of momentum,
which as a marketer's a dream forsomething to go you know, viral,
which is a word that we loatheand is not ever in a brief
(12:22):
but you kind of just hope thatmaybe you know, something will catch,
um, catch the attention of ofyour fans. And you know, when
you have a brand that's so embeddedin the flow of culture and you have
people who are so passionate about it, um, it kind of, you
know, organically happens. And soI think initially it was you know,
a few people here and there,and then by the end it was thousands
(12:43):
of people a day. Yeah,thousands a day a day. We kept
getting messages from our our contact therebeing like, yeah, there's a few
people here to say, oh,there's a thousand people here, and they
definitely uge the tenor of this hamletof eighty three people to be really like,
you know, kind of there arefifteen minutes of fame, so to
(13:07):
speaking, in Albertia, which atone point they're like, is this going
to last forever? Will we juststart to have thousand people a day?
So I think the temporary nature ofthe statue played into a bit of like
a bit of a good moment forthem, but then let them get back
to their their regular days. Butit was it was crazy yea, And
some of the subtleties that you justtalked about, Jess, I think we're
(13:28):
probably important and um well not probablyclearly important to the success of the campaign,
not sort of making a loud bang, as Josh said, not having
a logo on it, you know, and branding, not putting Chester nearby,
etc. Yeah. I think hadwe had a monster budget and some
you know, grand tent pole moment, we probably would have screwed it up
(13:50):
a little bit, right. Andso I think sometimes like there's just beauty
and simplicity of an idea, andthat's I mean, we talk about a
lot of you know, what isthe like true all of the idea?
How do you do that you knowas well as you can and kind of
remove the excess And so, youknow, this really was about generating awareness
that you know, the name ofthe orange stuff on your fingers is called
(14:13):
cheatle like that was that was it? Right? And so when you bring
Chester in, that does a differentstory. When you bring you know,
the logo in, that's a differentstory. This truly was something that you
couldn't really ignore. And then whenwe had you know, these fans kind
of show up in droves, theytook over, they built a Wikipedia page
for it, they did all theseTikTok um you know videos and social social
(14:39):
videos, and you know, theythey shared it organically and that's kind of
lightning in a bottle a little bit. And you know when I think it
doesn't come from the brand so avertlyit is something that people can claim as
their own. And this is abrand that fans have claimed as their own.
And so you know, how dowe do more things that are in
service of that? Yeah? Yeah, I think this brand is at its
(15:00):
best when it shows up very seriousabout whatever context it's in, because that's
the tension and juxtaposition of how ridiculousit is. Right. You know,
we've seen that with this brand globally. We've seen in the US and we're
just now, I think, startinginto that in Canada. But you know,
whether it's technology that the cheatle youknow, has a role in,
(15:26):
whether it's you know, getting youout of you know, tough situations that
you don't want to be a partof, or it's being part of a
culture of gigantic roadside statues. Ithink, you know, what we believe
about this brand is that you haveto kind of be committed and then let
the brand be the kind of lightnessto the idea, and I think that
(15:46):
the team did an amazing job ofbringing that to life. I don't know
if Cheatle has ever helped you getout of any tough situations, maybe avoiding
a phone call or helping with achore, regardless it's a problem or a
solution we've all experienced. We're goingto take a quick break and when we
come back, Jess and Josh discussthe impacts of the Cheatle and Cheatle campaign.
(16:21):
Welcome back to Partners Impossibility. I'mBrett Marshan. We know people arrived
at the small town of Cheatle inAlberta, Canada, population eighty three by
the thousands to get a look atthe Cheatle and Cheatle statue. And we
know that the original media budget wasonly five thousand dollars. But what was
the overall impact of this viral campaignand how was it perceived not only by
(16:44):
customers but by the marketing world.Listen, I want to talk a little
bit about all these international awards wetalked about upfront, because I think it's
you know, sort of awards showseason, right, Josh, and maybe
give us the highlights because there's youknow, if you listen them all,
I think it's going to take therisk of the podcast. So it's a
problem we're very flattered to have,that's for sure. Yeah, it is
(17:07):
like human today, and I thinkyou told me about three more of on
that are happening, so it's adaily occurrence. It's pretty exciting. Yeah,
I mean, it's amazing to seeCanada showing up on the on the
global stage and in a way thatlike it's probably leading even the US team
in terms of like this type ofactivity, and you know, we're getting
we've gotten trophies and attention from allthe kind of big international shows both in
(17:33):
the PR world like PR Week andUH and the Savers, but also like
one show Cleo's DNA D things likethat. But what justin I was just
talking earlier, like what's really interestingis it it's not just getting recognized in
like a PR stream, but it'sit's really getting recognized in out of home,
in brand experience and activation, inregional effectiveness, return on budget,
(17:56):
you know, overcoming challenges things likethat, which you know, I think
is really interesting and credit to theproject. Yeah, No, absolutely,
I mean I think it's it's it'sso exciting for the industry to acknowledge the
work. But I also think ithelps. What I'm the most proud of
is there is amazing creative work happeningin Canada, like outstanding innovation and creativity.
(18:19):
And I think that we have somebeautiful brands with PepsiCo Foods Canada and
Cheetos is one of many. Andlisten, I talked to a lot of
clients often, and I used tobe a client for a long time,
who say that awards don't matter andthey're not the all inhend all, let's
be honest. But you know,I always say that to marketers. Well,
(18:40):
if your campaigns aren't winning in internationalshows, that means they are not
standing out against a whole bunch ofother work, which means they are not
standing out in a very very crowdedmedia social media online market right now,
which means they're not kind of noticed. So you know, if you win,
you win the kinds of awards thatthis campaign's winning, it means that
(19:00):
people are recognizing it and it's standingout, which is god. It helps
you know, the brand and salesand a bunch of other things. Yeah,
you know, I mean I thinkit's a tricky one, right that
you never kind of set out towin an award, and I think if
if that had been the brief,we wouldn't have gotten to such a strong
idea. Um. And so youknow, it's always, I think a
little bit of a shared ambition togetheras a client and an agency partner to
(19:25):
have the work recognized and celebrated.But it has to come along with a
lot of other things. And whatI've noticed and Cheetos has been you know,
well awarded the original Cheatles strategy,one that Grand Prix and can for
creative strategy, and it's one youknow can Lions, it's one Cleo's in
the US. And so what wasso exciting for me is, um,
(19:48):
this I think is really putting puttingCanada on the map for you know,
how can we continue the narrative butin a way that's uniquely Canadian And I
think the cheatle and Cheatle and reallyleaning into Canadian culture in Alberta in such
a fun way is exactly how we'regoing to continue to do that. Let's
talk about the other measures of success. So I'm sure there were other things
(20:10):
that were important, Jess in thiscampaign, besides what we just talked about
an awards, So how did youmeasure the success of this? Yeah?
So, I mean the primary KPIwas, you know, will people associate
the word cheatle with the dust that'sthe delicious dust that's on your hands.
I think that's a check. Um. So I think we've gotten Canada and
(20:32):
beyond to talk about it, whichis super exciting. And then you know,
obviously we always believe that great workcan drive business that you are not
incongruent, and so when you havework that is so effective, it starts
to have people reconsider the brand orconsider the brand for more occasions. And
so we saw a tremendous amount ofgrowth on the brand. And it was
(20:55):
super interesting because when we looked atthe data, and we're able to look
at the data to pretty you know, micro level. We started to look
at the stores around Cheetah, Albertasold out of puffs. If you go
and you kept coin rings and ringsand rings out, you could not buy
a bag of these these puffs.And it was because people were buying them
to take pictures so they would holdit right with the bag and the statue.
(21:21):
Um. But what we thought,maybe it would stay local. But
what we saw the brand is absolutelyon fire. And so it's it's double
digit growth, which we haven't seenon the brand UM in quite some time.
And for a brand of this scale, you know, it's it's pretty
incredible for to have such an impactthe statue. Where does the statue go
next? Any We've had a lotof demand for the statue actually, and
(21:45):
we created a couple versions. Therewas one that was, you know,
meant to go to mister Cheadle.I think a lot of people think we
paid for that placement on on JimmyKimmel with the media landscape being so kind
of complicated, but that was allyou know, organic and earned UM.
And so you know, I thinkI think Don had a small reconsideration of
a seventeen foot statue in his frontyard. UM. And that plus the
(22:11):
thousands of people who would show upevery day to take correct I think he
I think maybe that was more itwas just safe run as a Wikipedia page
UM. But we decided to giftit to our US headquarters in Plano,
Texas. UM. It's a littlebit like a statue of liberty gift from
Canada to our US counterpart. Soit'll be uh, it'll live down there,
(22:32):
and then we'll have some that travelaround as well, and we'll have
one headquarters up here in Toronto aswell. But I think it's just a
start, right. Yeah, there'sa lot, a lot of places we
can take. You never know whereit's going to show up, So keep
your eye out for a statue.Geez, I wonder where next. Um,
thanks a lot for this is agreat campaign. I mean, it
is a great example by the way, in partners and possibility. You know,
(22:55):
it takes a break market or witha with a with a good idea
and a simple, simple brief inthe first place, like you talked about,
Jess, and you know, ittakes a really creative thinking and some
bravery to push push it out.And I just think this is such a
great example, and I'm with you. I you know, I hope this
puts Canada even more on the stageon the creative side of things. I'm
sure with your help Jess as well. So thanks very much for doing this,
(23:17):
and congratulations on all you have achieved. Thank you, Thank you for
having us, Brett, Thank youBrot. That was my discussion with Jess
baldin CMO at PepsiCo, Canada,and Josh Budd, chief creative officer at
Citizen Relations. Thank you for listeningto partners and Possibility. I hope you
gained valuable insights and inspiration for yournext collaboration.
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