Burger King Calls on OWN&P

Youth Campaign in the West May Be a Sign of Things to Come SAN FRANCISCO--Burger King has gone outside lead agency Lowe Lintas & Partners for a campaign breaking in the West from Odiorne Wilde Narraway & Partners. Ads aim to re-energize sales in the crucial youth market, and more regional work could be on tap for the San Francisco agency in other parts of the country. The fast-food chain has struggled in the West of late as rivals Jack in the Box and Carl's Jr. have carved out chunks of the youth market for themselves through budget menu items and smart advertising. OWN&P, which handles such youth-focused clients as EA Sports and Half.com, says it can bring the young crowd back to the home of the Whopper. "This is the first time we've ever said, 'Cut out a share for us as a minority agency,' " agency partner and planning director Keith McVaney said. "We've all worked with big companies in other jobs, but this is new for this agency. "We're just going to think about how to sell more burgers every morning. We want to give them a boost," he said. Billings for the campaign are $20-40 million, agency officials said. They added that more regional assignments could be pending. Officials at Burger King, based in Miami, and Lowe in New York declined to comment. OWN&P creative director and partner Jeff Odiorne said the arrangement was born out of a chance meeting six months ago at a barbecue. Odiorne, just back from speaking at a youth marketing conference, was discussing his agency's work for young audiences with a fellow partygoer who happened to work for Burger King. A few days later, Odiorne got a call, and the relationship began. Over the next several months, the company and the midsized shop plotted strategies for how the restaurant could make a comeback in the West. The deal was sealed at a fruitful meeting held in Las Vegas between representatives of the agency and of Burger King's franchisees. "It boiled down to having a couple of mavericks in the corporate structure who were willing to look at things differently," Odiorne said. The regional campaign has an irreverent feel, and is based around a "See the West for $1 a day" theme. It also uses the "Got the urge?" tagline created by Lowe for its national Burger King campaign. In the first 30-second TV spot, a voiceover talks about how to get "water-slide excitement" for free, as the ad shows a man using a Burger King tray to slide on a wet lawn. He then presumably spends his money on a 99-cent Burger King XL Deluxe sandwich, which is plugged. In another commercial, a man saves his money for Burger King food by riding a shopping cart instead of a roller coaster and jumping on a cactus instead of paying for acupuncture. Shorter versions of the ads are airing in Los Angeles to plug a deal for reduced-price hamburgers and cheeseburgers. Radio spots also currently breaking feature fake newscasts; they too plug the XL Deluxe burger.

Brand Marketing

Burger King Calls on OWN&P

Justin M. Norton

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Justin M. Norton