Prior to Covid19, Burger King was perceived as a more expensive brand by many.

This perception was mainly driven by:

1- The lack of a truly differentiated and unified value menu, despite having several “value items”.

2- Value items were communicated sporadically without a clear value proposition

3- Value items were seen as a cheaper low-quality version of the premium and core items.

To change perceptions, Burger King launched several promotional campaigns in 2019, discounting core and some premium items. And while sales increased momentarily, it faded away when promotions ended. Then Covid19 happened, and category sales plummeted.

Suddenly everyone was struggling,and brands, big and small, flooded the market with safety and hygiene messages, along with aggressive promotions in a bid to counter the unprecedented decline in sales. In this context, our brief was to relaunch Burger King’s value items

Online listening showed us that in some cases, people thought of value items as low quality products or as food near its expiration date, thus being discounted to minimize losses and waste. Category observations revealed that some competitors were investing heavily on their value-items communication while investing little in the quality.

This led us to our strategic direction:Position all current and future Burger King value items under one unified platform and show that quality is non- negotiable at Burger King, and the taste of our value items is on par with our premium items

We repackaged its previously obscure value items under one platform “the tough time meals” or “zanga” a very colloquial name and then relaunched this renewed menu through a stripped-down campaign which was produced at a low budget, using limited props, and a celebrity doppelganger cast, all packaged together in a hilarious, kitschy manner, with one key message: we are saving on everything, except the quality of our food

Our doppelganger looked almost identical to a famous, yet expensive celebrity called “Abou Hamdan” (the father of Hamdan). One whom we’ve previously collaborated with. And we called this guy: “Akho Hamdan” (the brother of Hamdan). While he was identical to the original, he had horrible acting skills.

The real purpose was not only to save on production costs, but to push people to tag the real celebrity “Abou Hamdan” and our story together, which will attract his attention and maybe his reaction, along with his massive army of followers and fans; eventually spreading our message even further.

The fake celebrity was buzz, and the real celebrity took the bait and jumped into the conversation that ensued, pushing our campaign even further and louder.

To supplement our message of saving on everything except on the quality of our food, we used less ink in our outdoors, produced half banners, and even went with black and white ink on printed materials like posters and food tray papers.

A message that resonated so well with Burger King’s fan base, that the relaunch generated a whopping 1547% increase in sales comparison to the same period of 2019, despite going through a pandemic.