Male Opps: Popeyes launches first campaign from new AOR (Score 93)

Sales Lead: Popeyes recently launched its first campaign from McKinney, which became its creative AOR in April 2023.

• The new campaign links Popeyes's foot approach to the uniqueness of New Orleans, the place of the brand's founding over 50 years ago.
• It rolled out across digital, OOH, and TV channels.
  • The campaign will also work with influencers.
• The brand will likely:
  • Popeyes also might need additional digital assistance since it parted ways with its former CDO, Elie Javice, earlier in 2023.
    • He is now the chief digital and technology officer at sibling brand Firehouse Subs.
  • Continue rolling out new work from McKinney
  • Pursue additional influecner partnerships
  • Keep implementing strategy shifts
  • Continue increasing spend
  • Conduct additional agency reviews
• Target demographic: 
  • A wide but male-targeted target demographic ranging from Gen-Z through Gen-X​​​​​​​

Additional spending insights:

• Broadcast insights (TV ad creative spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)
  • YTD spend: So far this year, Popeyes has spent approximately $34.1m on national TV commercials, up 3% from the approximately $33m spent within the same 2022 timeframe.
  • Last year: The brand spent around $101.6m on this channel in 2022 after having spent 3% more, around $105m, in 2021.
  • 2023 ad programming: Popeyes's 2023 commercials have targeted Gen-X watching shows such as NBA Basketball, NFL Football, The Big Bang Theory, Friends, and Bob's Burgers.
• Digital and social insights (digital ad spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)
  • YTD spend: The fast food chain has allocated roughly $5.3m toward digital ads YTD, 26% more than the roughly $4.2m allocated by this point last year.
  • YTD data: Since the beginning of 2023, Popeyes has earned ~670.7m digital impressions, 45% via Instagram ads, 40% via Facebook ads, and 15% via YouTube ads.
  • Last year: In 2022, the brand's estimated full-year spend decreased by 26% to $17.1m from that of $23.1m in 2021.
• Additional channel insights  
  • The brand utilizes local broadcast, OOH, radio, digital, print (newspapers), Google Ads, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, and online video (primarily via Youtube.com) ads.
  • Popeyes sponsors podcasts such as The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz, The NewsWorthy, The Joh Batchelor Show, and Skip and Shannon: Undisputed.

Additional agency insights:

• Opportunity: If you haven't yet done so, get in touch soon to see if PR, digital analytics, experiential, multicultural, and/or influncer hires follow Popeyes' recent AOR shifts.
  • ​​​​​​​It not only named McKinney as media AOR in 2023 but also named PHD as creative AOR in 2022.
• Current agency roster:
  • ​​​​​​​McKinney: Creative AOR (April 2023)
  • PHD: Media AOR (2022)
  • Alison Brod: PR AOR

Insight Sources: Broadcast insights estimated by iSpot; digital spend insights estimated by Pathmatics; additional channel insights estimated by Vivvix; podcast insights by Podchaser; DRTV insights by Media Analytics.