Well, we did it. The Twisties Great Flavour Debate (aka Chicken vs Cheese) just took home the award for Greatest Creative Campaign at the TikTok Awards. We couldn’t be happier that a 75-year-old snack sparked the most passionate national debate of the year. After all, what’s more Australian than arguing over chips?
The Brief: Get people twisted about Twisties again
Twisties has been around forever, but by 2024, the brand was starting to feel a little… stale. Sales were slowing, younger Aussies weren’t as engaged, and in a time of political chaos and serious news cycles, people were looking for a break.
Given that we’d grown up with the tagline of life’s pretty straight without Twisties, we saw an opportunity to do what Twisties does best by making life a bit twisted again. What better way to do that than by turning the age-old Chicken vs. Cheese recess rivalry into an all-out election, complete with celebrity candidates, impassioned debates, a campaign trail and a full-fledged voting system?
The Idea: The Great Flavour Debate
With 2024 shaping up to be the year of elections, we leaned all the way in. We started with chaos, announcing the launch of a hybrid ‘Chickeese’ flavour, sending Chicken and Cheese loyalists into a doom spiral. Then we gave Aussies a way to fight back with an official vote to decide, once and for all, which flavour would reign supreme.
Given that no election is complete without political heavyweights, we enlisted croc-wrangling legend Robert Irwin on Team Chicken, and popstar G Flip on Team Cheese. They rallied the troops, debated on social, and duetted, stitched, and memed their way through the campaign.
The Execution: A full-scale political movement, but snacks
We ran the campaign like a real election, rolling it out in three phases:
- The Crisis: Launching Chickeese and letting the outrage build.
- The Campaign: Robert Irwin and G Flip went all in, with influencers, media partners, and even vox-pop creators bringing the debate to the streets.
- The Vote: We wrapped it up with a massive ‘Democracy Twistie’ activation at Bondi, where Aussies could cast their votes IRL.
Our Great Debate content went live across TikTok, Meta, and YouTube before spilling onto the streets with a massive OOH play. An iconic Sydney tram was wrapped double, and our cities were plastered with campaign posters that evolved into ‘vandalized’ art throughout the campaign. Whether you were scrolling your feed, riding the bus, or watching TV, we made sure you couldn’t escape the question: Are you Team Chicken or Team Cheese?
The Results: These numbers don’t lie
Quite simply, the campaign sent Aussies feral:
- 702 million earned media impressions (67% above target)
- 132 million campaign impressions
- +21.8 point lift in ad recall (6.7x the category norm)
- +19.2% sales uplift (the real winner here: Twisties)
And perhaps the best metric of all? A comment that summed up the whole thing perfectly, “This is the only election that’s ever made me smile.”
