Little Debbie Share-a-thon

Best Vehicle-Based Experiential Campaign

Little Debbie Share-a-thon
Agency: Luckie & Co.
Client: McKee Foods

McKee Foods wanted to create the largest-ever product launch in company history for their new Little Debbie Chocolate Cupcakes, by giving away 1 million cupcakes on National Chocolate Cupcake Day (October 18th). They also wanted to grow their Facebook fans and Twitter followers to continually engage consumers and gain insights from their ideas on snack cakes. They came up with the “Share-a-thon Tour” to encourage consumers to try the product and share it with others, as well.

The tour, which visited 21 cities between October  and December, covered 6,808 miles. It consisted of four Smart Cars custom-wrapped to look like Little Debbie Chocolate Cupcakes along with a truck and trailer with similar graphics. One smart car had a webcam for recording consumer videos, for which participants received a cupcake t-shirt.

Six brand ambassadors, or the “smile squad,” handled sampling at each stop and took photos of consumers, who then received a unique code that allowed them to view, print, upload and email their photo, and find it on the photo mosaic. Consumers also had the opportunity to enter several sweepstakes to win a free carton of Little Debbie Chocolate Cupcakes. The tour was supported by television, radio, FSIs and social media.

As the largest promotion by McKee Foods in its 50 years, Share-a-thon made the Little Debbie Chocolate Cupcake the number one selling cupcake in America during the eight-week campaign, surpassing a competing brand that had been on the market for 90 years. They generated more than 1 million sweepstakes entries; consumers sampled more than 11,000 cupcakes on National Chocolate Cupcake Day in New York City alone; and 125,000 cartons in total were given away. Meanwhile, 500,000 people became fans of the Little Debbie Facebook page.

Go Back to the 2010 Pro Awards