We took one of the most popular games in Fortnite, Floor is Lava, and reimagined it to reach our gamer audience. Not only did we create a custom, immersive island with a Frank-cano that spewed Flava, we turned the game on its head by encouraging gamers to dive into the delicious flava, even though it meant losing the game. To incentivize players to lose on purpose, we worked with Fortnite to allow them to emote while dying for the first time ever in the game. A move that kept players coming back for more games and interacting with Frank’s RedHot.

Frank’s RedHot is the world’s #1 hot sauce. But to retain the title, they had to go after Gen-Z, a group with less prominent existing brand perceptions of Frank’s RedHot in comparison to older groups.

We realized there’s a huge untapped audience of Gen-Z’ers, who love to snack on saucy foods just as much as the next guy: gamers.

The brief was to integrate Frank’s into the world of gaming. Find a way to breakthrough as a brand while staying true to the game. Once we found Floor is Lava in Fortnite, we had found the perfect hot, orange, saucy way to reach our target. But we needed a twist, because no brand wants to make a game where people actively try to avoid their product, which is exactly how one wins Floor is Lava.

Fortnite is one of the most popular games among Gen-Z; a perfect entry point for Frank’s.

We wanted to create a game in Fortnite that gamers actually wanted. Then we found Floor is Lava and realized Lava is hot, orange and saucy, just like Frank’s RedHot.

To win Floor is Lava, players must avoid the lava to win. We knew we didn’t want to change how the game was played, but we also didn’t want players to actively avoid our product. So, we devised a simple strategy: let’s make dying the most fun part of gameplay so we can encourage players to dive right into our delicious flava on purpose.

Once you win a game, you move on. When you can die a different saucy, delicious death every time you play, you play more games and engage more with the brand.

A custom, immersive Fortnite island where Flava flows (Franks + Lava= Flava) and players were encouraged to dive into the delicious sauce.

Even though that meant experiencing the most delicious game over.

To incentivize players to plunge to their saucy death on purpose we worked with Fortnite to let players emote while dying for the first time ever in the game.

Emotes, or the dances used to celebrate wins and triumphs in the game, are one of the most fun parts of Fortnite gameplay. But it wasn’t until The Floor is Flava that losing was something worth celebrating, because you never lose when diving into Frank’s.

And because they could die differently every time they played, gamers kept coming back over and over again. Playing more games than they would have if they had won. And interacting way more with Frank’s RedHot.

We launched and promoted the game with a social campaign of :06s, :15s and static posts that teased the idea of emoting while dying in Fortnite and encouraged players to play, and lose, our game.

Twitch livestreams and content from Fortnite gaming legends - SypherPK (6.2m followers), AliA (27.7m) and TypicalGamer (13m) - were used to reach gamers where they game. Our gamer influencers played our game and lost repeatedly on purpose: going out in a blaze of dancy saucy sacrifices and getting their fans to do the same. Cutdowns of their gameplay were used for paid ads on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.

We even gave out free wings on delivery apps during key campaign moments, so that gamers could dive into Frank’s not just in game, but in real life.

Players absolutely loved it. Not only did we exceed our 550MM impression goal, but the game was a record-shattering success, with over one billion earned impressions in the US alone.

In under two months, 43,000 games were played with an average game play of 13 minutes. Both surpassing Fortnite Benchmarks.

Then we found real behavior shifts: After our Fortnite integration, 16-24 year olds across the US had significantly higher intent to recommend Frank’s RedHot to others.

And best of all, we saw a 10% year over year sales increase for Frank’s.

Frank’s RedHot successfully surpassed any of its previous Super Bowl impression numbers by appealing to its influential, younger audience and ultimately proved its relevance as the hot sauce of the next generation.