Around 1970, even in the developed West (pronounced USA), it was not the case that someone would buy chicken based on brand name...
Chicken is chicken.
That's it. Nothing more.
People bought what was available in the store. No matter how much you craved chicken, you had no brand preference – thus no brand loyalty either.
Then came a copywriter named Ed McCabe
You rightly ask, „Wattafak is Ed McCabe?”
The youngest human intelligence ever inducted into the „Copywriters Hall of Fame.” At 34 years old. Not bad.
By the way, he was a co-founder of the [in our small country, understandably unknown] Scali – McCabe – Sloves agency. He created masterpieces like the „Drive it like you hate it” campaign for Volvo.
This guy didn't do what you think: he didn't raise a provocative chicken influencer. He didn't generate a fishy-smelling AI influencer for the company.
McCabe put the company owner, Frank Perdue, in the spotlight. He featured him in the ads.
The man who by his own admission resembled a chicken more, than anyone else.
Let's say there was something to that.
From a certain angle...
he really did resemble one.
The ad itself looked like this
Frank, with his balding (chicken) head, looked into the camera and delivered his lines. He kept talking, but he said it in a way that MADE YOU FEEL: he interprets it as a personal insult if you buy chicken from anyone else from now on.
The slogan – somehow – went like this: „Only a tough guy knows how to cook chicken really well.”
Totally simple message.
Maybe too simple.
That's why it worked.
Of course, you might say that „what a nonsense this is, sir”, but that doesn’t make you right. It isn’t because the market said, „Okay, from now on I’ll buy chicken from this chicken-like person.”
Probably added
an X-factor to the campaign's success: IT WAS CLEAR that this guy was obviously not an actor. Due to the Perdue ads, many likely thought that „if this guy is advertising his chicken with this Hollywood incompatible head, then it must be delicious.”.
How did the campaign go?
In short? Well.
Perdue Farms„ sales SEVEN-FOLDED. I’d like to remind you that at that time, the population of the USA was 20 times larger than that of our little country; let’s not even talk about economic power, because our overworked brain will immediately throw off the chain. ”In America” there are big numbers. The bottom line is: if you can seven-fold a nice big sales volume with an advertising campaign, that’s incredibly genius. An amazing achievement.
Well… this is how the world’s first BRANDED CHICKEN was born.
Little color #1
Around 1970, a TV commercial was FOUR AND A HALF MINUTES long.
Today? 10-20-30 seconds.
Little color #2
Chicken-like Mr. Perdue – from a certain angle – resembled both Jeff Bezos and Alfred Hitchcock.
Little color #3
Perdue Farms has more than 20,000 employees.
That’s it. That’s all. By the way, it’s an incredible tactlessness to publish a chicken article on Easter day. Anyway, it’s already happened.
Gábor's further articles on the marketing secrets blog can be read here.
