Macca’s builds on ‘The Original Mouthful’ work with modern make-over of the Big Mac Promo via DDB Sydney, adam&eveDDB, OMD and Snapchat
McDonald’s Australia, DDB Sydney, adam&eveDDB and OMD have unveiled the full, integrated ‘The Original Mouthful’ campaign for the iconic Big Mac, following the revival of one of the world’s oldest burger chants earlier this month with a TV and out-of-home campaign.
The second phase of the integrated campaign, designed to encourage fans’ participation, sees Macca’s bring back the original Big Mac chant promotion. Launched back in 1987 and a fond memory for existing Big Mac fans, the promotion has evolved via a tasty and Australian-first AI challenge, in partnership with Snapchat.
The Big Mac chant challenge – an innovative game available through Snapchat, TikTok, and the MyMacca’s app, is designed to engage younger generations who are not familiar with the chant that entered the Aussie vernacular for their parents and grandparents. Big Mac lovers from the 70s, 80s and 90s will fondly remember the classic chant: “Two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun.”
Big Mac fans will be able to test their chanting skills, with rewards on offer for correct renditions of the chant within four seconds. Winners will receive a voucher code for a small Fries and Coke which can be redeemed with any Mac Family range, including the return of the Mac Jr and Grand Big Mac, purchased between April 17 and May 8.
Unlike 1987 where fans were required to go instore to compete, DDB Sydney, adam&eveDDB and OMD partnered with Snapchat to build an Australian-first bespoke Lens, allowing the Snapchat community to undertake the chant challenge and win a MyMacca’s voucher code, directly within the Snapchat app. Powered by Snap’s innovative speech recognition technology, the Lens recognises speech and detects the correct list of delicious ingredients from a trained machine learning model, to reward a winning result to users on the spot.
Says Samantha McLeod, marketing director, McDonald’s: “We have already had such an incredible response to the first phase of our Big Mac campaign with super fans already reciting the chant they remember so well and younger generations now bringing new life to the chant as well. The next promotional phase of the campaign is set to challenge all Big Mac lovers – from the 80s right through to today – to recite the famous chant in a fun and engaging way. We can’t wait to see fans put themselves to the test on social media and see who meets the challenge!”
Says Matt Chandler, executive creative director, DDB Sydney: “The best part of the Big Mac chant campaign we grew up with was always the challenge to beat the clock and win yourself free Macca’s. You can’t bring back the chant without bringing back the promo. We had a unique opportunity to take this iconic jingle – a thing that went viral before there was even an internet to go viral on – and hand it over to Macca’s fans online. It’s going to be fun to watch the nation take on The Original Mouthful in this new and innovative way.”
To encourage participation among fans old and new, the Big Mac Chant Challenge will be everywhere. Aussie celebs took on the 4-second challenge in the jungle on Network 10’s I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here! Australia; Karl and Sarah will tackle the tongue-twister on the Nine Network’s Today show; and clubs from the NRL and AFL will go head-to-head to claim being the fastest to recite the chant.
The TV commercial and online video will promote the challenge with authentically crafted and decade-specific spots. In addition, fans’ socials feeds will be flooded with prompts, attempts, fumbles and more. And fans will be celebrated in reactive digital out-of-home to fuel the ongoing conversation and competition as it unfolds.
To ensure the campaign is inclusive for everyone to join in on the fun, DDB Sydney, adam&eveDDB and OMD also worked closely with disability consulting firm Get Skilled Access (GSA). GSA worked on creating an accessible way for people with varying types of access needs, focusing on including those who are non-verbal, blind or have low vision, as well as people who are deaf or hard of hearing, allowing them to participate in the campaign. The accessible features not only benefit people with disability but also allow all fans to have a more seamless way to interact with the campaign and be rewarded.
Says Emily Bosler, head of McDonald’s at OMD: “We’re building the next generation of Big Mac fans, engaging younger Aussies and encouraging them to have some fun with the famous Big Mac chant. Extending seamlessly across all channels and working with our partners, like Snap, to elevate the consumers’ experience through ‘feel good’ moments of connection and creating more unique Macca’s moments for customers.”
Says Haran Ramachandran, head of creative strategy, APAC at Snap Inc.: “It was fantastic to partner with the team at McDonald’s, DDB and OMD, to bring the iconic Big Mac chant to Snapchat. Our augmented reality Lens transforms the chant into a tactile and engaging challenge, where everyone can join the fun! It’s testament to the unique capabilities of our platform to make advertising more human and immersive, and we’re excited to see the Snapchat community rise to the occasion and take on the challenge.”
The Original Mouthful Big Mac TV campaign launched earlier this month and leans heavily into the Big Mac’s 56-year legacy. A 60-second hero film takes burger fans all the way back to 1968, when Big Mac creator, Jim Delligatti, initially devised the now iconic burger. The film then travels through the Big Mac’s evolution across the decades, showcasing just how the burger and its ingredients have stood the test of time.
For the next phase of the campaign, additional promotional ads, each with a different decade specific treatment, will encourage people to take part in the Big Mac chant and share their efforts on their social channels.
Client: McDonald’s Australia
Chris Brown – Chief Customer Officer
Samantha McLeod – Marketing Director
Liz Whitbread – Senior Brand Manager
Luke Elzerman – Experience Optimisation Manager
Chloe Brannagan – Brand Manager
Creative Agency: DDB Sydney
Stephen de Wolf – National Chief Creative Officer
Matt Chandler – Executive Creative Director
Cam Hoelter – Group Creative Partner
Stephanie Allen – Senior Copywriter
Andrew Torrisi – Senior Art Director
Paul Jansen – Senior Designer
Sophie Hackett – Junior Art Director (Social)
Amy Morrison – Junior Copywriter (Social)
Mandy Whatson – Group Managing Partner
Adam Blaynee – Group Business Director
Chloe McIvor – Senior Business Manager
Rene Shalala – Executive Producer
Jess Taylor – Producer
Katharina Wynne – Strategy Partner
Katy Andrews – Director Social and Content Strategy
Creative Agency: adam&eveDDB London
Richard Brim – Chief Creative Officer
Sarah Todd – Chief Growth & Integration Officer
Martin Beverley – Chief Strategy Officer
Production Company: Revolver
Director – Leilani Croucher
Managing Director / Co-Owner – Michael Ritchie
Executive Producer / Partner – Pip Smart
Senior Producer – Serena Paull
DOP – Andrew Commis
Production Designer – Damien Drew
Costume Designer – Sophie Fletcher
Post Production: ARC EDIT
Executive Producer – Daniel Fry
Producer – Sally Quade
Editor – Elise Butt
Colourist – Edel Rafferty
Online Artist – Richard Lambert
Online Artist / VFX – Patrick Campbell
Sound & Music: Smith & Western Sound
Nick West & Dan Higson
Media: OMD
Emily Bosler – Head of McDonald’s
Zoe May – Head of Strategy
Catriona Oran Barthram – Head of Comms Planning
Hattie Dinger – Director, Entertainment Partnerships
Taylor Hilditch – Account Director
Anna Heslop – Senior Account Manager
Matt Wallace – Senior Manager, Sport Partnerships
Christian Agliozzo – Manager, Sport Partnerships
Platform: Snapchat
Dan King – Senior Client Partner
Bethany Rao-Davies – Senior Account Manager
Haran Ramachandran – Head of Creative Strategy, APAC
Claus Stangl – Senior Creative Strategist
Chris Lewis – Senior Creative Producer
PR & Influencer: Mango
Tabitha Fairbairn – Managing Director
Ashleigh Vallance – Senior Account Director
Nada Duyker – Account Director
Sidney Balfour – Senior Account Manager
MyMacca’s app and POS: Akcelo
April Tunstall – Business Lead
Melanie Tozer – Senior Account Director
Alex Kostiouk – Senior Project Manager
CRM: Digitas
David Huang – Account Director
12 Comments
Too Long Didn’t Read
Lots of credits for a campaign that’s just a rehash of an old one. Do the original creatives get a shout out?
https://campaignbrief.co.nz/2022/12/22/maccas-speaks-late-night-this-silly-season-in-new-campaign-via-ddb-group-aotearoa/
What’s a comment section without a link to work that isn’t the same, but appears the same to some, but just isn’t the same?
mispronouncing a big mac because you’re drunk and mispronouncing a big mac ingredients because you can’t remember them is two insights funnelling into the same execution. A picture of a burger and some funky words over it for the exact same brand and the exact same product. Most would say it’s more like the NZ work than it isn’t
A re-release press release of a re-release campaign
https://campaignbrief.com/maccas-speaks-strayan-in-newly/
Yes, two identical looking posters with headlines like ‘A Mig Back Congo Peas’ and ‘Shmecial Smauce Lettuce Cheese’ are in no way similar
Love the art direction on the tv
Bit lame you don’t get a Big Mac.
I’m impressed. How brilliant is it that AI can decipher when a non-verbal person person is delivering the ‘original mouthful’. Please DDB, post that. That is genuinely interesting and worth reading.
I remember that day when we ran out of ideas. It was a Monday, naturally. This wasn’t obvious to many at first, but inevitably, it was inevitable. With only a finite amount of ideas left in the inner city turmeric latte district, you could count the seconds on a digital Casio watch before the ideas would dry up. First, we started rehashing old ideas under different guises. This worked for a time, but, with the rising age of AD (anonymous dickhead), our game of cleverly rehashing 1984 D&aD print ads was over. Then, some clever creatives packaged their ideas as ‘remixes’. Alas, very quickly, AD cottoned on to the fact that remixing wasn’t a new idea either, with a spurious link to some thing that had been remixed before. Then, we discovered innovation. The golden era. When outer-ring suburban house owners could finally buy a prototype smart peg that tells them when it was raining outside. These pegs were especially useful when their windows were broken or they happened to be deficient in any of the senses a human generally possesses. Finally, we discovered causes, which was great for racially confused intersex snails, but almost as terrible for our client’s business as the smart pegs. And then, came AI.
Now the suit’s long-planned obsolescence of the creative department could finally begin. The suits were about as ecstatic as a suit can get, which isn’t very excited just incase you’re wondering. Kind of a chat-GPT level amount of enthusiasm. But with no ideas left, and no ideas to come up with, the expensive, wild, rambunctious, artistic ego-bull-ponies could be replaced by cheaper archetypal demographers of a gentrified mixed-income persuasion. Out with the red Ferraris and the pony tails, in with the red biros and the non-corrective glasses. No more surprises, and an efficient amount of less surliness. Hands folded across knees, top button tied, far easier for the suits to manage, and more importantly, dominate.
Not long after, the machines took over the creative department. Turns out they were better at rehashing old stuff and easier to push around. But hey, at least creatives can still flip burgers, and probably earn more money per hour doing so.