Milk West Alliance wanted to improve milk’s perception among teens and get them to drink an extra half-glass per month.

Research showed that teens enjoy milk the most with their favourite foods. It also showed that teens feel pressure to do well at school. However, they also like to chill at home or with friends. Much of this chill time is spent consuming online content.

The brand wanted to help teens enjoy their downtime with a glass of milk and their favourite food. Knowing they couldn’t outspend the likes of Coke, Red Bull or Gatorade, the brand needed to find a space for milk that would cut-through the clutter in a meaningful way. This challenge was made difficult by the fact that teens are hard to reach with traditional advertising and even harder to engage.

With that information, an unbranded cartoon web-series was created called snack time. The web-series featured a milk carton-shaped character named Carlton joined by an array of cartoon snacks that go with milk. The web episodes had no traditional product shots nor a call-to-action but were instead designed to be enjoyed like any other online content.

The YouTube channel had a new episode every two to three weeks, releasing 26 episodes over a year, totaling 75.

To scale the campaign, it deployed a series of tactics designed to hyper-target teens not only in their online environments but also in the physical world. Using first and third party data to isolate teens, skippable YouTube was the primary driver complimented by Facebook and Instagram, in-game mobile and native placements on Buzzfeed. To best associate milk with their favourite snacks, the team timed its media energy during the key snacking window - between after school and dinner.

In the physical world, the brand also used place-based tactics using Snapchat geo-filters around high schools, rec centres and cinemas. It enhanced entertainment value in cinemas by customizing Snapchat filters during the opening weeks of major blockbusters.