Burger King’s mascot, the King, has never been a man of many words. Zero actually. But all that changed when we realized 2 things. 1) That April 15th was the 199th annual celebration of National American Sign Language Day. And 2) that despite being America’s favorite hamburger for more than 50 years, there was no official sign in American Sign Language (ASL) for the Whopper.

In ASL, proper nouns don’t usually have a specific sign, they have to be finger spelled, letter by letter, and unlike any other language, there’s not a regulatory linguistic entity that creates new signs, they come from the people themselves and then spread.

So the King broke his long-lasting silence, but he did so in ASL, to celebrate the Deaf community and invite them to create an easier/official way to order the Whopper in their language, the #WhopperSign

The week leading up to National ASL Day, we sent the King to a Burger King in Washington DC adjacent to the largest Deaf University in the United States. We transformed the restaurant, changing every word to ASL. As Deaf people came in we had cameras in place filming their reactions and interactions with the King as they suggested and discussed loads of different signs with him. From the footage we released an online film to celebrate National ASL Day and also continued asking for more Whopper Sign suggestions online using #WhopperSign.

During ASL day, the King had hundreds of video conversations via social media with everyone who sent suggestions using the #WhopperSign, replying with personalized videos to each of them.

In the end, the King, together with the Deaf community, co-created the official sign for the Whopper, making Burger King the first brand with a sign in ASL.

Results for April 15, 2016, National American Sign Language Day:

+3 Million views. That’s 3 times the deaf population in the US.

The campaign had a 98% positive sentiment

+120.000 Shares on social media.

+200 Million Media Impressions

Burger King granted a Scholarship for Deaf Students at Gallaudet

Over 200 Whopper Sign suggestions.

First ASL sign co-created with a brand.

The Whopper sign is going into Burger King’s employee training manuals so that

anyone will be able to order a Whopper using it.

The campaign was targeted specifically at less than 1% of the US population; the Deaf and who speak American Sign Language (ASL). Every element in the campaign was created in, or translated into ASL, literally speaking to only the Deaf community to celebrate their beautiful language and make them feel special for National ASL Day. The hearing world didn’t understand ASL and got to feel, if just for a few moments, the world that the Deaf community lives in and understand why inclusion for everyone is so important.

In a society where the Deaf are commonly misunderstood or overlooked completely, having the support from others (including corporations) is more than necessary. Only 7% of the U.S. population speak American Sign Language (ASL). Our target: the Deaf community and those who speak ASL, a community spread out all over the country, numbering anywhere from 500,000 to two million people which is less that 1% of the population. Our approach: use The King’s power of generating awareness and his ability to engage with people in the real world to celebrate the differences that make us all perfectly imperfect. Our strategy: connect with the Deaf community by using ASL, a language most don’t understand, all while promoting our flagship Whopper that most know and love. Burger King is all about authenticity and believes everyone should be their way, even if you’re misunderstood and people have a hard time speaking your language.

In 2011, Burger King retired The “Creepy” King mascot in favor of a new ad campaign that took the brand in a different direction. Research showed The King’s way wasn’t working anymore and he wasn’t communicating Burger King’s strengths like he once did. Gone were the days where The King would sneak up on unsuspecting guests in their homes. But in 2015, after being absent from any marketing efforts for four years, the brand wanted to bring him back to help generate greater ad awareness. This time around, however, The King would no longer be intentionally creepy. The King’s new role: embody the new brand positioning - “Be Your Way.”

Objective: build brand love with meaningful and unexpected experiences that strike an emotional connection with people. The brief: Put The King in the real world and get people talking about things that are important to Burger King’s brand and values.