Kraft throwing one big long party for Oreo’s 100th

Kraft is celebrating the 100^th birthday of its Oreo cookie with an integrated marketing effort that aims to reach Canadians of all ages and across multiple platforms.

Nearly a year in the making, the birthday celebration campaign officially kicked off late last month with a television commercial and will continue to build through the summer and back-to-school season.

From an on-pack promotion to the introduction of a new birthday cake flavoured cookie, the 100^th birthday celebration is one of the most robust campaigns Kraft Canada has launched for the cookie in recent years, said Emma Voirin, senior brand manager on Oreo.

“We wanted to look back on the great years that we’ve had and to celebrate the kid inside,” she said. “From eight to 88 everybody can celebrate the twist, lick and dunk.”

The campaign tagline is “Celebrate the kid inside,” which appears in video and print and on a global Facebook page that invites fans to share a video, story or photo of how they’ve let their inner child free.

The page has surpassed 25 million “likes.” Oreo’s Canadian-specific Facebook page has 900,000 fans, with the hopes of reaching 1 million by the end of the year, said Voirin.

While Oreo’s 100^th birthday is a global celebration, Voirin said the overall campaign has been built on a “glocal” (global + local) model, tailored specifically for the Canadian consumer.

“Each country worked with a global team,” she said. “Based on the mission, which is to ‘Celebrate the kid inside’ we are activating very locally and very differently around the world based on our consumers.”

The 30-second television commercial from DraftFCB for instance uses vignettes from popular Oreo cookie ads that have run in the past. The music is also original to the Canadian spot, said Voirin. MediaVest handled the buy.

A media relations program managed by Strategic Objectives and Kraft that includes media tours of its Montreal factory and birthday wishes from premiers, mayors and local dignitaries has so far helped garner 20 million PR impressions, said Voirin.

The festivities continue Tuesday with birthday party hosted by comedian Colin Mochrie at Toronto’s Eaton Centre.

Other agencies working on the campaign include Trapeze, Armstrong Partnership LP, Mosaic Experiential Marketing, Pigeon Branding + Design, and Katermeg.