Three years in, KFC’s “Believe in Chicken” series is getting its own game show. This latest instalment brings a clever twist to a campaign that was compelling enough to inspire nearly 10 million fan responses to its March ad, of whom 50,000 applied to put their love of chicken to the test for all to see.
Don’t Crack is a 30-minute YouTube game show created by Mother for KFC, and is possibly the final instalment of the “Believe in Chicken” campaign. The 30 contestants, who range in age from 22 to 65, include a self-proclaimed witch, a police sergeant, a martial arts trainer, a London tube driver and an NHS GP.
A single person takes the £50,000 golden egg prize. On the way, the winner had to beat 29 other contestants in four rounds of trials: first they were blindfolded and asked to navigate traps in search of golden eggs, then they were asked to perform competitive “acts of devotion”, and next came a challenge where they were punished for any glance away from the golden egg. The final two had to race to shed the first tear of joy in order to emerge triumphant. Julie Hewitt, adjudicator on Traitors, made sure all was above board.
Monica Silic, CMO at KFC UK&I, said: “We haven’t rented someone else’s audience for this. We’ve put our chicken-obsessive fans on screen, and we’ve given it over 30 minutes rather than ninety seconds, because long-form is what it takes before you genuinely care who wins.”
Tomas Coleman and Derek Man Lui, ECDs at Mother, said: “For three years, we’ve been building the absurd universe of ‘Believe in Chicken’, establishing its own rituals and mythology. ‘Don’t Crack’ felt like the natural next step, giving our Believers the opportunity to showcase this obsession in a real, high-stakes gameshow. It’s a quintessentially KFC way to celebrate this fandom and what it stands for, which is, as always, chicken.”
Director Pablo Rochat of Iconoclast said “Working with Mother and KFC on Don’t Crack was incredible. Their strong vision, combined with real KFC superfans, as well game show production experts, gave us the chance to test crazy ideas and push a gameshow about chicken as far as we could. It’s amazing what we were able to accomplish.”
It’s not the first online game show from an advertiser. Back in 2012, JetBlue did a live show, broadcast daily for one week from a TV studio with a full set and guests appearing via Skype.
There have been others since and gamification of all kinds is everywhere now, but there’s a uniquely satisfying logic to the KFC version and the way it makes the campaign feel like it’s been building up to this from the start. Watch full show below.
MAA creative scale: 8
