Working in partnership with EssenceMediacom & The Pharm and Spark Foundry, campaigns for Boots and Asda win at this years Newsworks Awards.

Working with Reach, Boots conducted a YouGov survey that revealed significant regional variances in health behaviours and knowledge. This informed the campaign’s strategy, which would leverage its position as a trusted health brand to educate audiences through localised, real-life case studies and creative executions.

The content partnership with Reach included print advertorials, print display, VOD, and digital display. The localised print advertorials featured personal accounts of high blood pressure and weight related illnesses. Digital display ads ran in relevant health environments across Reach and in newsletters published by the Mirror and the Express.

Dynamic ads ran on our local information platform InYourArea, which pulled in the nearest Boots stores and offered users a health check. Personalised formats included an interactive map on mirror.co.uk informing readers about local BMI and blood pressure stats.

75,000 health checks were conducted at Boots during the campaign – up 76% versus pre-campaign. The campaign drove a 41% uplift in awareness of the Boots health check service and 14% uplift in agreeing they would turn to Boots if looking for support for a health problem, according to Reach brand lift study.

Econometrics from Ebiquity showed the print and content partnership activity drove the highest profit ROI of all the campaign’s media channels and had a knock-on effect on sales across other Boots categories. What is more, Boots data demonstrated 2,320 people who received the health check proved to require on-going monitoring, making this campaign potentially life-saving for these individuals.

Over the past year, economic, environmental and geopolitical events presented significant challenges for Asda. The rise in inflation exacerbated the already harsh cost-of-living crisis and nationwide food shortages ensued. Asda’s challenge was not only to navigate these hurdles but also to communicate effectively to customers the actions being taken to alleviate their pressures. Asda endeavoured to reassure customers, providing a light-hearted moment of relief during a period of record low consumer confidence.

Asda also partnered with us here at Reach, leveraging the Daily Mirror for their highly reactive, strategically placed and slightly tongue-in-cheek ad campaign. The first ad, featuring a prominent lettuce, urged readers to “Romaine calm” while assuring them that Asda’s efforts to restock would “bear fruit”. This ad was placed in The Sun beneath an article about a turnip shortage.

In the Daily Mirror, Asda highlighted its own brand beans next to an article discussing a Tory MP’s recommendation to buy Tesco Value beans instead of the pricier Heinz alternative. The ad used wordplay to convey that Asda was “full of beans,” demonstrating Asda’s understanding of the of rising cost-of-living crisis and providing an opportunity to showcase the favourable results of an independent taste test that ranked Asda’s beans superior to its competitors.

Asda’s ‘Romaine calm’ ad caught the attention of several trade titles, including Campaign, amassing significant positive sentiment towards the brand online. The Drum named the campaign of the ‘Best Ads of the Week’ (alongside Nike), saying: “Yet again, a print ad addressing a supply chain issue resonated with people”.

The ‘Romaine calm’ campaign successfully combined timely, witty messaging with strategic placement within trusted news brands to engage and comfort readers during a period of uncertainty.

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