When Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider came calling, Kraft Dinner said, yes, we are going to take it.
The brand, which changed its name to KD in July, has signed on as a sponsor for “Dee Snider’s Rock n Roll Christmas Tale,” a holiday musical running in Toronto until January 3.
“Dee Snider’s people approached us specifically on Kraft Dinner to see if there was an opportunity to partner, given he would be in Toronto and that KD is a great Canadian brand,” said Samantha Taylor, marketing lead, meals solutions, Kraft Heinz, which owns the KD brand. “This is a great opportunity for us to connect Dee [and his show] with the Kraft Dinner brand given we have a strong sense of humour and a great connection with Canadian consumers.”
To promote the partnership, KD has launched “The 12 Dee’s of Christmas,” a series of humorous online videos created by Taxi 2. The videos show Snider in his dressing room preparing, eating and even making music with KD. In the first spot, Snider is wearing a toque and eating KD, and asks, “What could be more Canadian than that?” He then adds some maple syrup to his bowl, then spits it out and says, “too Canadian!”
The videos are posted to YouTube and KD is pushing them out on Twitter and Facebook every day for 12 days. “We knew we wanted to be active on social and this was a really natural way to have a conversation over a period of time with consumers and introduce them to some really fun content,” said Taylor.
Kathy Murphy, head of communications at Kraft Heinz, said the sponsorship is a great example of how the company is capitalizing on opportunities and making sure it’s a part of ongoing conversations with consumers.
“We’ve talked about being more nimble and making sure that we’re relevant and top of mind,” she said. “It’s a good proof point for how we’re doing things now.”
