Grounded in unapologetic enjoyment, Pepsi and burgers unapologetically go together. But for 30+ years, the top U.S. burger chains have served their burgers with Coke due to exclusivity deals, even though burgers go better with Pepsi.

To understand U.S. consumers’ actual preferences, Pepsi commissioned third-party blind taste tests to discover how burgers from three U.S. chains paired with different beverages. The results: participants preferred Pepsi over Coke.

#BetterWithPepsi posters came from this insight and the brand’s desire to shake up the Summer cola wars. By expertly folding burger wrappers, Pepsi unapologetically poked the burger giants on #NationalBurgerDay and revealed how even when Pepsi isn’t on the menu, it’s always in the picture.

The posters were strategically placed outside U.S. burger chains with an OOH budget of $129K. Additionally, it ran in The New York Post and across social media, ultimately earning 3.6 billion impressions and 29% increase in brand consideration.

Despite Pepsi winning head-to-head taste tests, the brand remains a challenger to Coke in the U.S., averaging 30-40% share historically. In the summer of 2021, Pepsi wanted to dominate the Summer burger- eating season by reminding consumers what can improve their burgers. The answer is not the sandwich ingredients, but a crisp, refreshing Pepsi.

One of the biggest and most frequent burger occasions in the U.S. is the restaurant meal, but for decades Pepsi had been locked out of competing at the top burger chains due to exclusivity deals with Coke. Pepsi wanted to lean into this tension.

By expertly folding burger wrappers of the top three U.S. chain, we poked the burger giants on #NationalBurgerDay, revealing how even when Pepsi isn’t on the menu, it’s always in the picture.

By working with an origami artist to expertly re-craft the top burger chains’ wrappers and running the poster images across OOH, print and social media, Pepsi unapologetically poked the burger giants on #NationalBurgerDay and revealed how even when Pepsi isn’t on the menu, it’s always in the picture.

The core building block of the initiative was the paper artwork that uncovered Pepsi’s logo in the wrappers of the top burger chains. With three key poster images, the campaign was simple, yet unforgettable, resulting in global reach despite being created for the U.S. market.

The campaign caused an instant shakeup within the cola wars, with Adweek claiming it as the brand’s best work in years— arguably ever. It achieved 3.6 billion impressions, driven across the ecosystem including OOH, Twitter, programmatic (TMZ, Radar Online, Perez Hilton), and print. With 1.3MM Twitter engagements at an 11% engagement rate, engagement was 720% higher than the typical Pepsi trademark benchmark of 1.34%.

The OOH drove 1.16M impressions across NYC, LA, Dublin OH, Miami and Chicago, with the New York Post print driving an additional 181K impressions.

The simple, yet expertly crafted reminder also led to a 29% increase in brand consideration and a 1.1-point share swing from Coke vs YAGO— exponential in a $29B category.

Overall, the campaign performed well when compared to the 3-month rolling benchmark, achieving the equivalent of 83% of impressions over the span of a quarter in just five days.