Valentine’s Day Campaigns You Can’t Help but Love
Updated 12/02/24
It’s that time of year: flowers, chocolates, Moonpig card deliveries, and literally anything you can think of covered in red and pink hearts.
For those in love, it’s a big day, but for the marketeers, it’s an even bigger day.
We asked the Shooting Star team what their favourite Valentine’s Day campaigns are, and here’s what they came up with…
Our Account Executive Lizzie is a big fan of the 2020 Gü “Love Notes” campaign, which consisted of a “light-hearted packaging refresh” across Gü’s cheesecake range.
Even though it was part of an integrated campaign, the update to the packaging worked well as a stand-alone tactic, as people were more likely to notice the product on the supermarket shelves.
Valentine’s Day is an important time of year for luxury dessert brands as according to Gü, they are “perfect for date night”.
The fun aspect encouraged people to think of their own lyrics and post them on social media using a dedicated hashtag, which got people talking about their brand.
The lyrics on Gü’s packaging included the following examples:
- “I’m in love with the shape of Gü” Sumptuous Salted Caramel Cheesecakes
- “And I will always love Gü” New York Cheesecakes
- “Cause all of me loves all of Gü” Peruvian Key Lime Pies
- “I can’t help falling in love with Gü” Zillionaire Cheesecakes
This was a sweet campaign. Quite literally.
Senior Marketing Manager Emma has chosen KFC as her favourite brand with a memorable Valentine’s campaign.
In 2020, KFC collaborated with Pizza Hut, Crocs and Moonpig to stir up some love for the popular fried chicken restaurant. It achieved increased searches on Google for KFC by over 4000%.
Emma’s personal favourite was the Moonpig scratch and sniff cards, which is kind of gross, but the greeting messages were brilliant, and included ‘You’re Finger Lickin’ Good’ and ‘We Go Together Like Chicken & Gravy’.
Not only was the campaign a hilarious nod to the popular brand’s products and catchphrases, but the company also donated 10% of all proceeds to the KFC Foundation which supports young people in the UK through grant funding.
Digital Marketer Jacob is a fan of Tyson’s Nuggets of Love campaign. This campaign put a fresh spin on the traditional Valentine’s bouquet of flowers by challenging consumers to create their own chicken nugget bouquet of flowers.
The winner of the contest won a limited-edition heart-shaped chicken nugget bouquet which was only available through this contest.
User-generated content in exchange for free chicken nuggets? That sounds like a win to us. In the words of meme sensation King Curtis, “Chicken Nuggets are like my family.”
Director Kate shared a stunt by Virgin Trains to promote their £42m East Coast route revamp that has stuck in her mind since its launch in 2016!
As part of the campaign, the company invited passengers to take a trip in a singles-only ‘Love Carriage’.
The 125mph experience took place on 14th February on a specially chartered train from London King’s Cross to York, and passengers switched seats throughout the journey in a bid to meet potential suitors.
The campaign was fronted by Channel Four’s First Dates Fred Siriex who officiated as matchmaker and ensured would-be couples received a first-class service.
With only 24 tickets up for grabs people had to apply through the Virgin’s website to secure a much-coveted seat.
This was a simple but really effective campaign which offered lots of follow-up story ideas and benefitted massively from the Fred factor. After all, who wouldn’t want dating advice from Britain’s best-loved maître d’ and self-styled love guru!
Digital Content Executive Dan wanted to finish off by sharing Hotels.com’s Anti-Valentines campaign. So far, we have presented plenty of original ideas of lovey-dovey Valentine’s campaigns, but how about a funny one for the singles?
The website designed a landing page which advertised a free ‘Valentine’s Dumpster Stay’. The visitors were asked to write why their ex should have a holiday in the dumpster. It was a light-hearted campaign full of sarcasm, pettiness and plenty of laughs.
While it’s unlikely your ex would have stayed there, customers could enjoy the satisfaction of receiving the confirmation email.
Valentine’s Day isn’t all about romance. It’s also about fast food innuendos, delicious desserts, and abs.
Who knew?
HT
Updated 12/02/24
DB
