America has lost its milk habit! As household consumption declines, purchase frequency and sales at retail go with it. New competitors, such as soymilk and bottled water, added to the steady decline. Adult women, 25-54, have long been the milk purchasers in the family, but they have stopped drinking milk themselves. We needed to give them a new, interesting reason to drink milk and engage them in the boring dairy aisle. Our challenge was to reframe milk, make it relevant to women again and create news in a dull category.

While women are consuming less milk, they are consuming a lot of lattes out of home. And the best thing about lattes? They’re mostly milk. We realized we could increase the frequency of milk purchases if we could encourage women to drink more of the lattes they loved, by making them at home. To do this, we had to overcome a few barriers. We needed women to make the connection that milk is the primary ingredient in a latte, and show them that making lattes doesn't require fancy machines or a barista.

Latte Love achieved a 1.03% incremental lift in milk volume sales – that’s 1.08 million incremental gallons, exceeding program goal by 47% during the 4-week period. This showed that purchase frequency increased because milk’s household penetration is 91%, meaning an incremental lift could only come from more frequent purchase.

The program created 421,000 active Facebook users. The number of people visiting our page who also entered the promotion doubled that of past programs, with a 79% entry conversion rate. And mobile accounted for 20% of all entries, quadrupling milk’s historical benchmarks.

Latte Love spoke to women with the language and imagery of love. Rose and pink illustrations evoked romance and whimsy in the sea of white and brown in the milk and coffee aisles. Shoppers engaged with a simple 3-step recipe and QR code that drove to a fanciful “How To” video evoking the feeling of a French café showing the simplicity of making lattes at home.

A fun quiz engaged women who entered to win a Latte Essentials Kit every hour.

A pop-up cafe in Times Square kicked it off where celebrity spokesperson Maggie Gyllenhaal served drinks to latte-loving women.