Submitted by Smoking Gun

Persil: Cook With the Kids

Smoking Gun built a cook with the kids campaign for Persil Washing Up Liquid that reports over 200,000,000 opportunities to see across 68 pieces of coverage.

Meanwhile, online, we generated a 350% increase in daily visits to the Persil Washing Up Liquid website and gained over 100,000 parent 'promises'.increase in daily website visits
The campaign video we created, 'host your own pizza party', was shared by 24 media outlets and viewed almost 6,000 times.media outlets sharing campaign video
Our approach to this campaign resulted in 68 pieces of coverage, including six pieces of national coverage and 39 total hits mentioning the new formula, creating in total, over 200,000,000 opportunities to see.opportunities to see
Meanwhile, online, we generated a 350% increase in daily visits to the Persil Washing Up Liquid website and gained over 100,000 parent 'promises'.parent 'promises'
our post-campaign survey found that as a result of our activities, 72% of parents were more likely to cook with their kids and a stunning 86% were more likely to buy Persil Washing Up Liquid.parents more likely to cook with their kids (post-campaign survey)

Case in 60 seconds

Persil needed noise around a reformulated Washing Up Liquid in a short period of time, because the agency was working against rivals with bigger budgets who could respond once the launch became visible.

The campaign appears to turn on mess being the barrier rather than the mess itself being the problem, because commissioned research found 88% of parents do not cook with their kids for fear of the aftermath, which gives a washing up liquid a reason to be wanted.

Borrowing the dirt is good thinking already attached to the Persil laundry brand, the agency encouraged parents to make a mess in the kitchen with their children and positioned the harder working formula as what handles the aftermath.

A digital campaign invited people to sign up to a cook with the kids promise with a downloadable pack of tips, recipes and food facts, while a blogger event ran pizza making, cupcake decorating and a giant food fight, supported by media relations, competitions, advertorials, video seeding and in store promotions.

Smoking Gun reports 68 pieces of coverage, six pieces of national coverage, 39 total hits mentioning the new formula and over 200,000,000 opportunities to see, alongside a 350% increase in daily visits and over 100,000 parent 'promises'.

Strategy Breakdown

The primary strategy-learning section — interpretation, not a press-release summary.

Parents, and busy mums in particular, who buy washing up liquid and cook at home with their children.
Cooking with children is treated as something parents want to do and avoid at the same time, and the page places the mess of the kitchen as the reason the intention does not become behaviour.
Washing up liquid competes on a functional claim that is hard to dramatise, and the agency notes rivals held bigger budgets, so a formula improvement of 12% needed a reason for parents to care about it.
Persil positioned itself as the solution to the aftermath rather than the subject of the campaign, which let the product carry a permission message while the activity stayed about families cooking together.
Based on the available evidence, the promise mechanic asks for a small public commitment before any purchase, which suggests the agency treated intention as the step to secure and left the product to follow from it.

Creative & Execution System

Partners

  • Smoking Gun (lead_agency)

Participation mechanic

  • Parents signed up online to a 'cook with the kids' promise and downloaded a pack of tips, recipes and fun food facts, with bloggers and their children taking part in a pizza making, cupcake decorating and food fight event.

Results & Evidence

MetricValueResult type
increase in daily website visitsMeanwhile, online, we generated a 350% increase in daily visits to the Persil Washing Up Liquid website and gained over 100,000 parent 'promises'.performance
media outlets sharing campaign videoThe campaign video we created, 'host your own pizza party', was shared by 24 media outlets and viewed almost 6,000 times.performance
opportunities to seeOur approach to this campaign resulted in 68 pieces of coverage, including six pieces of national coverage and 39 total hits mentioning the new formula, creating in total, over 200,000,000 opportunities to see.performance
parent 'promises'Meanwhile, online, we generated a 350% increase in daily visits to the Persil Washing Up Liquid website and gained over 100,000 parent 'promises'.performance
parents more likely to cook with their kids (post-campaign survey)our post-campaign survey found that as a result of our activities, 72% of parents were more likely to cook with their kids and a stunning 86% were more likely to buy Persil Washing Up Liquid.brand_lift
pieces of coverageOur approach to this campaign resulted in 68 pieces of coverage, including six pieces of national coverage and 39 total hits mentioning the new formula, creating in total, over 200,000,000 opportunities to see.performance
share of bloggers writing positively100% of the bloggers who attended the workshop event or received new formula washing up liquid wrote positively about it.performance
video viewsThe campaign video we created, 'host your own pizza party', was shared by 24 media outlets and viewed almost 6,000 times.video_views

Why Smoking Gun's strategy worked

  1. 1

    Commissioned research can convert a product claim into a social permission, because the 88% figure gave Persil a barrier to remove rather than a feature to assert, and the removal is what the campaign asked parents to act on.

  2. 2

    An established brand property can be lent across categories, because borrowing dirt is good from laundry gave the washing up line a recognisable position without buying awareness for it from the start.

  3. 3

    Compressing activity into a short window reads as a deliberate answer to budget asymmetry, because concentrated coverage denies larger rivals the time to mount a response before the launch has landed.

  4. 4

    Putting bloggers inside the mess rather than sending product alone appears to have driven the sentiment, since the agency reports 100% of attendees and recipients wrote positively and attendees described the food fight in their own words.

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