KFC may not be an official World Cup sponsor, but in Canada it has found an alternative way to gain an association with the super popular event.
On Tuesday, KFC Canada announced it’s sponsoring a series of YouTube videos that feature a chicken named Carly making World Cup “predictions.”
In the videos, the chicken decides between two cups of food, each placed under the flag of a World Cup team. The flag she eats under is the team she picks to win. So far, 80% of Carly’s predictions have been correct.
Jeff Collins, a senior copywriter at the brand’s digital agency, Grip, explained that the videos started as an agency project inspired by the client rather than an assignment. He said that he and his partner, art director Anton Ratinsky, were inspired by Paul The Octopus, an animal that made game predictions during the World Cup in 2010.
Collins discovered that one of the agency’s creative directors, Bob Goulart, had a family of pet chickens north of Toronto and had started publishing videos in early June. After seeing how accurate Carly was, the brand signed on as a sponsor and started sharing the videos on its Facebook page.
In an email to Marketing, KFC Canada CMO David Vivenes said, “KFC Canada’s Facebook fans are enjoying following Carly’s predictions and find it funny that KFC is sponsoring Carly. We’re all cheering for her.”
This is one of several World Cup-related initiatives KFC has launched globally. In the U.K., the brand tapped BBH London to create a TV spot filmed in Brazil. It has also introduced Brazil-themed sandwiches in some markets and held a free World Cup viewing party for a U.S. game at its KFC Yum! Center in Louisville, Kentucky.
