After more than a decade of next to nil advertising, Tasty Baking Co. has hired an ad agency and plans to roll out with a major integrated campaign over the next several months. And while the firm’s last campaign ended 13 years ago, many can still sing along to the jingle, “Nobody bakes a cake as tasty as a Tastykake,” or envision a peanut butter candy “kake” swatted into the goal as a promotion during Philadelphia Flyers games.
Tasty Baking, last week named New York City-based Berlin Cameron/Red Cell Advertising to implement advertising and promotions for its Tastykake brand as well as execute creative. Planning is in the very early stages but is likely to include sponsorships, coupons, sampling, event marketing, TV ads and other media, said Monica Christ, director of marketing for Tastykake.
After the long hiatus, changes in top management — including CEO Charlie Pizzi hired last October–put advertising the brand back in focus, Christ said. Vince Melchiorre was hired in January as chief marketing officer, followed by Christ last month.
“The focus in the past was not on the Tastykake brand equity, it was on short term volume,” Christ said. “We have a strong equity despite the lack of advertising, and knowing that, our biggest opportunity is to harness that brand equity by talking to our consumers through advertising.”
Media buying, handled by Harmelin and Media Co., Bala Cynwyd, PA. will be about $2 million, she said.
Consumer market research is about to get underway to define the Tastykake customer and how best to target that market.
Tasty Baking has annual sales of $255 million and more than 150 products under the Tastykake brand. It puts out 4.8 million “kakes” a day.
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