Pepto-Bismol Takes a Bite Out of Summer
Best Sponsorship or Tie-in Campaign
Agency: MSL New York
Campaign: Pepto-Bismol Takes a Bite Out of Summer
Client: Procter & Gamble
Pepto Bismol ‘light’ users are consumers 18-49 who keep a bottle of Pepto Bismol in the house for emergencies, but don’t often use it. Procter & Gamble wanted those consumers who have a bottle in-house to use it more frequently.
They created a publicity tour that kicked off with a partnership with Nathan’s for its July 4th Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest. The sponsorship included branded signage, a logo on the championship belt, t-shirts and product integration of the winner taking Pepto-Bismol after the contest.
The program continued with a two-week multi-city food festival tour with the winner, world champion competitive eater Joey “Jaws” Chestnut, reminding consumers to reach for the Pepto.
After the Nathan’s contest, P&G partnered with Major League Eating (MLE), the governing body behind several sanctioned eating contests, and hosted four more contests: the Bite of Oregon, Austin Ice Cream Festival, San Francisco Street Food Festival and the National Buffalo Wing Festival in New York.
Media outreach surrounded the program in two waves: the first in June announcing the sponsorship of the Nathan’s Contest via an exclusive write-up in The Wall Street Journal and the second in July announcing the four-city tour with spokesman Joey Chestnut. Press information was pushed out to national and local television, daily newspapers, radio, wire services, online and key food, sports and lifestyle bloggers. Micro-contests offered product giveaways and additional eating contests were held featuring Chestnut.
Interviews were conducted with spokes-eaters of the four contests (as well as Chestnut) via morning shows, entertainment shows, sports television/radio and print. The Pepto messaging was incorporated in all interviews and ESPN broadcasts. B-roll footage was distributed to local media outlets nationwide. Pepto-branded photo cut-outs were distributed and uploaded to a Pepto Bismol Facebook page; and branded thundersticks were handed out at events.
Overall, sales of Pepto-Bismol increased 10 percent during the month of July, with sales in New York, the location of the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating contest, increasing 20 percent. Social media discussions of Pepto-Bismol generated more than 650 tweets and nearly 41,000 Facebook Likes.
The summer promotion garnered more than 1 billion total impressions, including coverage in top-tier national media such as The Today Show and CNN. P&G reports that this campaign reached more consumers through PR in two weeks than in the entire previous fiscal year.
