Co-operative Food: Born & Bred Report

The PR team at Co-operative Food worked with markettiers4dc to handle the broadcast launch of their Born & Bred: British Food Sourcing Report in December 2014. For this campaign, strategic planning took place well in advance of the launch to ensure the investment announcement was primed for maximum broadcast interest.

The report itself fused a weighty business investment promise from The Co-operative – pledging to increase British sourced fresh meat, fish, dairy, fruit and vegetables over the next three years – alongside unique consumer data on what shoppers really want to see in British supermarket aisles
and why.

The research, developed by markettiers4dc and conducted through sister research agency, Opinion Matters, helped to give an otherwise business-focussed announcement story broader editorial context for consumer audiences – demonstrating through robust statistics that ‘Britishness’ matters more now than ever when buying food for our families, especially in the wake of recent scandals such as horsemeat. Equally, to give the campaign both business and consumer cut-through, a senior brand spokesperson – Head of Food Policy – was enlisted for all national news outlets alongside real-life farmer and broadcaster, Jimmy Doherty, to open up softer consumer broadcast opportunities across the regional network.

More than 150 items of broadcast coverage were secured including agenda-setting opportunities on BBC Radio 4’s Today and BBC 5 live’s Wake Up To Money programmes. Meanwhile, an interview with commercial news hub, Sky News Radio ensured almost blanket coverage across the UK’s commercial radio network on the day, while separate interviews were delivered across a broad spectrum of regional BBC outlets where farming issues matter most, including BBC Wales, BBC Kent, BBC Norfolk, BBC Shropshire and BBC Cumbria to name a few. To support the Co-op’s own outreach across print, online & social media, markettiers4dc also designed a branded infographic to illustrate the key statistics from the research.

“I was impressed with the level of enthusiasm and expertise markettiers4dc provided towards the development of the campaign. They gave thoughtful and insightful consultancy advice to strengthen the campaign and achieve real media cut-through. The team handled every aspect of our push for broadcast coverage from planning, to sell in to managing the technical elements on the day and boosted the confidence of spokespeople by offering coaching advice on messaging. A really great service from start to finish.”

Craig Noonan, Head of Retail PR, The Co-operative