2024 Winner

CASE SUMMARY

Every week, Canadian mailboxes and inboxes are stuffed with yet another wave of special offers on pizza. The competition for every pizza order is fierce. Even the largest multinational brands can sell 50% or more of their pizzas on deal.

With so much noise in the market, a good offer is not enough to break through. They needed to help Pizza Pizza stand out against the noise of the category – with all its price points and cheese pulls — to make a campaign as compelling as the offer
behind it.

In July 2022, just a few days after one of the largest interest-rate hikes in history, Pizza Pizza launched the Fixed-Rate Pizza — a four-topping extra-large pizza with a low price that was guaranteed not to increase for a full year.

The initial campaign launched on a shoestring budget with an animated video, a press release, and a small amount of paid media support.

But by tapping into a cultural moment, when the cost of living was on every Canadian’s mind, the Fixed-Rate Pizza became an instant phenomenon. On a total budget of a couple hundred thousand dollars, it generated sales of $8 million in the first six months.

It was an easy call: By the end of the year, Pizza Pizza had decided to extend the lock-in period by an additional six months. The question was, how could they extend the reach of the campaign even further?

The first phase of Fixed-Rate Pizza had played on the tropes of financial marketing. For the second phase, they took it even further.

The “Canada Is Locking In” campaign extended the Fixed-Rate Pizza to broadcast television for the first time. The spot was a parody of Canadian financial advertising, including such classics as, “It’s Patrick, he took out life insurance.” A cross-section of Canadians talked about how the Fixed-Rate Pizza made their pizza ownership dreams come true — and all without a medical exam!

With its timeliness and humour, “Canada Is Locking In” broke through the category noise and picked up fans along the way.

According to post tracking, people who recalled seeing the campaign were 43% more likely to intend to visit or order from Pizza Pizza in the next 30 days, 7.3 percentage points more likely to say Pizza Pizza is a fun brand, 5.2 percentage points more likely to say Pizza Pizza is good value for money, 12.4 percentage points more likely to say they like what Pizza Pizza stands for.

The Fixed-Rate Pizza is now the #2 special on Pizza Pizza’s menu. And with over 2 million Fixed-Rate pizzas sold and counting, the Fixed-Rate Pizza is one reason why Pizza Pizza’s same-store sales have grown in the double digits every quarter
since launch.

Credits

Agency: Zulu Alpha Kilo
Chief Creative Officer: Zak Mroueh
Executive Creative Director: Brian Murray
Creative Director/Art Director: Michael Siegers
Creative Director/Copywriter: Jonah Flynn
Designer: Ana-Marija Vlahovic
Agency Producer: Jesse Brook
Account Team: Alyssa Guttman, Erika Dafoe, Alex Berube
Strategy Directors: Heather Segal, Cameron Fleming
Client: Pizza Pizza
Clients: Adrian Fuoco, Amber Winters, Adam Williamson, Ivy Yu, Raymond Luk
Media Agency: Media Experts and Abacus
Media Experts Team: Kareem Boulos, Faebri Michetti, Tamara Kassouf, Lily Lazzara, Blake Goldring
Abacus Team: Rebecca Barak, Julia Cymbalisty, Jason Quintal
Production House: Steam Films / Undefined
Director: Matt Atkinson
Director of Photography: Rob Scarborough
Executive Producer / Line Producer: Julian Weiman
Production Manager: Tony Phibbs
Coordinator: Kailey Shanque
Post-Production Company: Zulubot
Post-Production Producer: Sarah Dayus, Siddhi Patel
Editor: Micah Rix-Hayes
Editor Assistant: Adrian Gluvakovich
Colourist: Gary Chuntz
Online Artists: Mike Sevigny, Felipe Chaparro
Music House: Doane Music
Music Composer: Creighton Doane
Recording Studio: Zulubot
Voice Talent Director/Audio Engineer: Dino Cuzzolino