SELLING SMASH

During the 60's, dehydrated mashed potato, otherwise known as 'SMASH' was the perfect and popular substitute for potato.

In the 1970's Cadburys used alien robots who would laugh at footage of Earth women peeling potatoes as their television advertising campaign.  The campaign was so successful that it was voted the '20th century's best' by 'Campaign Magazine'.

Taking on board the 'research before getting creative' strategy, our task this week was to carry out reactive research with the public that could potentially help us reintroduce the product by creating a dynamic and successful advertising campaign for 'Smash'.

The questions we asked members of the public were:

- what makes you happy?

- what was your favourite childhood meal?

- do you make a point of purchasing healthy food?

- do you read the nutritional information on food packaging?

- do you/have you ever bought instant meals?

- do you like potatoes? why?

- what is your favourite meal at the moment?

While we were asking these questions, we also asked the public to draw their favourite meal on an ipad.  We felt that this would make the whole experience more interesting and more creative!  Turned out, introducing the ipad to the conversation actually caused people to panic mid conversation as they had no idea what to do with the ipad..maybe they were just afraid to draw, who knows..

We surveyed about 20 people altogether, however the majority were either students (aged 17-24) or the elderly (aged 60+).  I felt that we were in the wrong location to interview those of 25-59, however we fortunately managed to talk with a 27 year old young uni professional.  It was really useful to receive information from all 3 age groups.

With the information we collected, we created 3 personas:

After creating these personas, I had some ideas for a potential advertising campaign that could target both the male and female student population.  The advert would show a male student attempting to make 'smash' -however he messes up every attempt.  Just before he decides to give up, a group of 5 attractive female students enter the kitchen (obviously friends of another flat mate) they obviously notice the failure of the young male and begin to  laugh!  The young male is embarrassed, however he then takes the opportunity to get to know the group of girls by using his 'puppy dog eyes' to ask them for their help.  The final scene will show the male grinning, eating his smash, surrounded by the 5 girls.  

The tag line could be, ''the perfect way to meet your match- SMASH!''

who knows...-it could be a hit. haha.