In early 2019, Reese’s Pieces launched the brand’s first and only innovation in its 42-year history, when it introduced Reese’s Pieces Peanut. The product is simple: a peanut, inside peanut butter, inside a hard candy shell. However, there was a similar product out there from the well-established Peanut M&Ms, posing stiff competition. Furthermore, the overall confectionery category was in decline, meaning reduced marketing dollars from Reese’s parent, Hershey’s.

The agency recognized an opportunity to revive a hidden equity of the Reese’s brand. In 1982, Reese’s Pieces was the lead character’s favourite candy in one of the world’s biggest blockbuster movies: E.T. Fast forward to 2019 and the brand’s presence in pop culture had endured. The team set out to leverage Reese’s connection with the themes of space and mystery to help launch their exciting new product.

Tapping the insight that the target will seek out shared cultural experiences to escape their everyday routine, the strategy was to celebrate Reese’s “otherworldly” associations through tongue-in-cheek, visually provocative experiences. Building on the E.T. space theme, the campaign mirrored the premise of another popular blockbuster, INCEPTION, whose plot centred around hidden dimensions and stories within stories. The campaign didn't have a blockbuster advertising budget or a licensing deal with either film, so the team had to get resourceful, with the objective to leverage Reese’s unique physical characteristics – a peanut hidden inside another peanut – to gain attention, surprise and delight, and drive sales.

To spark excitement, the ‘peanut inside peanut’ messaging had to be demonstrated in a breakthrough way. The idea of ‘Peanutception’ was born. The delivery of multiple, high-impact, visually-driven experiences was orchestrated to invite consumers into Reese’s Pieces Peanut’s unusual world and make the campaign impossible to ignore. To dramatize the brand’s unique, ‘nested’ format, giant custom 3D peanuts were placed on out-of-home superboards in high traffic, urban areas to maximize impact and generate talk value. To reinforce ‘peanut within a peanut’, the campaign used out-of-home and transit ads to deliver cheeky ‘poster within a poster’ creative. The concept was extended through entertaining video content, distributed across TV/OLV and social, boldly inviting viewers to experience an ‘ad inside an ad’.

In a Canadian first, the team created an otherworldly experience which transported passengers to another dimension through customized, reflective elevator wraps, which created an infinity mirror effect, inspired by the famous Kusama Infinity Mirrors, reinforcing the nested nature of the product. Finally, the brand pushed traditional OOH to new dimensions, partnering with an aerospace firm to design a custom high-altitude balloon rig that carried a fully stocked Reese’s Pieces Peanut in-store display literally into outer space. The mission? To offer E.T. a free sample of his new favourite candy. This ‘extreme OOH’ was scaled through an innovative content partnership with Entertainment Tonight, prompting massive national media coverage of the OOH stunt.

This breakthrough, innovative use of high-engagement OOH, orchestrated across multiple environments, was unprecedented: elevators, 3D superboards, transit and... outer space. The launch exceeded sales targets by +282% while the campaign was in market. This closely resembled original 1980s results, when the original Reese's Pieces experienced a 300% sales lift following the E.T. film release. The campaign amassed 147 stories from national media, earning an incredible 96MM impressions. Awareness was further amplified through 1.8MM online video views of the extraterrestrial OOH activation, which generated 12,000+ reactions and over 1,000 shares on Facebook.

The agency’s exceptional OOH approach thrust the brand into the cultural conversation and captured the imagination and attention of millions of Canadians. By tapping into the audience’s rich associations with space, small lovable aliens and dimension-bending blockbuster films, The Reese’s brand was re-energized and the launch of Reese’s Pieces Peanut was taken to spectacular heights.