Who likes salty snacks? Young adults 18-24, who eat them 5.3 times a week according to market research firm Mintel. So where’s the best place to pitch your snack to these folks? TV inspired by social media seems to be one strong avenue, at least for Wheat Thins.
The Nabisco division of Kraft Foods has been trying to reposition Wheat Thins as a stand alone snack, not a cracker that needs to be topped by cheese or dips. So the brand has, for the past year, focused on social networking to reach its targeted youth market, according to a recent story in the New York Times.
It launched a TV ad campaign last summer, paying surprise visits to consumers who mentioned Wheat Thins on either Twitter or Facebook. The first ad created by the Escape Pod of Chicago, featured Tabitha Hancock, who lives in Los Angeles and had written on her Facebook page that because she was “outta wheat thins,” her “life is officially over!” Hancock got a knock on her front door by a film crew, traveling in a van that says, “The Crunch Is Calling.” She was interviewed while a forklift lowered a pallet of Wheat Thins in her driveway.
Other spots surprise consumers who had posted about using Wheat Thins as picks to play air guitar or wondering if noise-canceling headphones can effectively block the sound of Wheat Thins being chewed. The ads, called Twitterventions, have garnered about a million views on YouTube, but some viewers have doubted their authenticity.
That led to a great follow-up. In October, Derek Tzeo, who lives in Portland, Ore., wrote in a Twitter message that the commercials were “uber fake.” In a new commercial, the Wheat Thins film crew surprises Tzeo on a street with a pallet of Wheat Thins.
