Kepak recognised for innovative Rustlers brand campaign
Kepak is delighted to have been shortlisted for the prestigious International Marketing Award at the nation’s premier marketing event, the All-Ireland Marketing Awards (AIMs).
Through this nomination, the Kepak team behind the Rustlers brand has been recognised for the innovative, perception-altering ‘Better Than You Think’ campaign.
Rustlers, which is owned by Kepak, is one of the largest Irish-owned food brands with a presence across Ireland, Germany, Belgium and Holland complimenting a significant UK presence where it has a retail sales value of more than £115.4m.
Kepak identified an opportunity for growth for the brand through a renewed category vision and to meet these ambitious growth targets, we needed to tackle a consumer perception challenge. Rustlers embarked on a repurpose and packaging rebrand project to overcome these challenges.
As part of the initiative, Kepak’s marketing, category, technical and operations teams undertook significant research to better understand the shopper profile and evolve the brand’s purpose, implementing a clear range hierarchy and a clean packaging rollout to future proof the brand. From this, Rustlers’ newly defined audience, convenience seekers, was born – capturing shoppers’ busy lifestyles and desire for brands to fit into their lives with convenient, tasty meals.
‘Better Than You Think’ was born from the fact consumers were pleasantly surprised the products were genuinely Flame-Grilled and made with the 100% Irish and British Beef that Kepak is renowned for. The creative aims to dial up Rustlers quality and taste credentials, educating consumers by demonstrating provenance and taste – found to be the most motivating driver in shifting those negative perceptions.
The campaign has been one of Rustlers’ strongest performing marketing campaigns to date, effectively engaging key audiences across a variety of platforms. Outperforming expectations, the campaign achieved more than 144m impressions in the UK, with Ireland achieving over 16m multi-channel touchpoints, gaining acknowledgments globally.
The carefully selected media channels ensured Rustlers captured the attention of shoppers, delivering a consistently effective message across markets that emphasised the brand’s quality and taste credentials and ultimately changed previous misconceptions.
The success of the campaign was thanks to the hard work and dedication of Kepak’s cross-market teams and agency partners who ensured we targeted relevant consumers at key moments with consistent relatable messaging across the countries the brand serves.