New Burger King Ads Upset Mothers, Others.
"Nothing like ultra-processed burger-flavoured breast milk".
Happy Sunday.
On September 26th, Burger King, via their UK ad agency BBH London, unveiled these “real” ads featuring brand new mothers’ first post-birth meals—BK burgers delivered, and the delivery time.
They picked the 26th because that is the day most babies are born in the UK. Timing-wise, remember that no one loves Christmas more than Brits.
For that day, BK setup “The Grill Line’”, a hotline that provided a Burger King Whopper® Meal to mums who had just given birth.
However some marketing and ad people, on LinkedIn in particular, wagged their fingers and tsk-tsk-ed their tongues at the “horrible” campaign.
Not having experienced child birth (except, as a child, I don‘t remember it, Mom said it was mostly painless, she was 18, I was her only one), the ads didn’t upset me. But that didn’t stop other members of the male sex from weighing in:
Any mothers out there named “Gasper”? Well, here’s a mother and “Baby Central” marketer punching the BK ads in the solar plexus:
Ouch, Terri.
Here are the BBH creative credits on this campaign, via AdsOfTheWorld:
Creative Director: Felipe Serradourada Guimaraes
Copywriter: Charlie Pendarves
Art Director: Chloe Stephenson
Director: Phoebe Arnstein (she directed the accompanying video for the ads)
Two men, and two woman (yes, Charlie is a man, and he is the senior creative here, and knowing how this process works, it’s probably his concept).
BK and BBH did research, via Mumsnet. Their survey of more than 2,000 mums found that over a third of respondents (39%) said their first post-birth meal felt like the ultimate version of that meal. And it revealed that a burger and fries were amongst the most wanted post-birth indulgences, with over a third of respondents (39%) saying that they would have appreciated a burger or fries as their first meal after delivering their baby.
Asier is a woman, no knowledge on whether or not she’s a mother. I ain’t doing that invasive digging.
Male Gregory, CGO at Whoppah (no association with The Whopper® or BK), brings the marketing criticism. I, a senior creative, don’t believe this campaign is an example of “creativity for creativity’s sake” nor “spray and pray” (a favorite buzz-phrase of marketers when criticizing creative work).
Other execs defended the work.
Daina is a COO and mother.
CD Sara injects here own creative idea into the campaign. I like “BURGERQUEENS”.
Founder Carl comes closest to my opinion of the ads: I don’t like the campaign creatively, but it did get lots of people in the industry standing on digital soapboxes. I’ll try to follow-up if I see any research on how UK moms reacted to the ads. But, it is a successful PR stunt for BK.
What do you think?
I like it. I think it gives a healthy, visceral un-feminine view of new motherhood which feels real and is a change from cutesiness. I believe the women in these pictures have been through something tough and physical and have earned a big unladylike mouthful of junk.
I'm disturbed. Why must they hold the baby and the burger at the same time, for pete's sake! We're always multitasking. Why? It's ridiculous! Put the baby down and enjoy your burger... there are better ways to portray this - way better.