Case Study: Country Time Legal-ade
Drinks brand Country Time Lemonade sat in Kraft-Heinz's roster, gradually being forgotten, gathering dust. Its future was uncertain until the FMCG giant decided it was time to give the brand one final moment in the limelight by launching an integrated campaign called Legal-Ade.
"They wanted to make a small bet on the brand and see whether we could do anything with it," explained Leo Burnett Chicago Creative Directors Pete Lefebvre and Ryan Stotts.
For the brand to have a future, it needed to capitalise on its heritage, as Eric Mills, Country Time Brand Manager, describes: "We still had strong summer associations and our brand values seen as nostalgia with hints of Americana. People had simply forgotten about us, and we were in danger of fading out of people's lives."
For the Leo Burnett team used to work on household name brands, this brief provided a new opportunity and using creativity for social good: "Like fixing up an old building, this seemed like an exciting reclamation project. The brand had good bones; there seemed to be a lot to work with."
The idea
Unlike its canned and bottled competitors, Country Time comes in powder form, so children can 'make' it themselves. Leo Burnett and the client agreed it was perfect fodder for a lemonade stand, and creativity for social good. They decided to explore the urban myth that children often get 'busted' for holding lemonade stands.
After further research, the team discovered that, in fact, this was no myth. "It happens more than you think." Claim Lefebvre and Stotts: "The origin came out almost like a joke: 'If these kids are getting busted, let's get them lawyered up like everyone else in America. Hahahaha….oh wait, that might work.'"
Production
A genuine legal fund was set up, which covered the costs of permits and fines for holding lemonade stands in the USA, up to $300 per individual.
With a limited budget to match the size of the brand, production of the explanatory film had to be done 'fast and loose'. The team credit producer Natalie Dahl for making the budget work: with a production space set up in an old dental office (found on Airbnb), and red-eye flights making it possible.
For the film, director Sara Shelton was at the helm. The tone would be crucial, and thankfully, Shelton "immediately understood that it had to be fun, but at the same time people needed to know this wasn't a joke and we were serious about legal defence."
The brand did not want to be seen as 'finger-pointing'. As Lefebvre and Stotts explain, "Country Time is a fun, scrappy, humble brand that knows it can't take itself too seriously. If we had said we're going to save the lemon tree rainforest, people would have called BS; it wouldn't have been authentic to who the brand is. But we saw a situation that was relevant to us where we could credibly affect some needed change."
Launch
As post-production was undergoing its final touches, the team were out to dinner and received a phone call. In Denver, Colorado, a child had been busted for running a lemonade stand. "It was like Divine Intervention," recall Lefebvre and Stotts. "The extended team sprinted to launch two weeks earlier than planned. It was a mad scramble, but we were able to use real events as a springboard into the media."
Of course, that came with its risks: "Our worry was, because of time constraints, we'd fuck it up by letting something slip through the cracks."
Response
They needn't have worried. The award-winning integrated Legal-Ade campaign ignited a host of debates on news and current affairs media – including CNN and the Wall Street Journal, "while people pointed the finger at different reasons for the problem everyone was positive about kids and the brand."
The team had aimed for an 80% positive sentiment in the coverage; in the end, they achieved 99%. There was a tangible sales effect too - Country Time saw its most significant sales and share spike in seven years. But the impact went even further – states actually began to change their laws around lemonade stands.
Denver (the site of the initial infraction) changed the city laws to allow lemonade stands, the entire state of Colorado followed soon after. Texas declared 'Lemonade Freedom Day', and Louisiana and Tennessee changed their laws as well. Furthermore, New York, New Jersey, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania all have law changes in the works. In each these cases, Country Time was directly attributed as the catalyst of change.
If a clever "when life gives you lemons advert" taps into culture and strikes the right tone, they can change brand perception, sales and society. That's precisely what this award-winning lemonade campaign did, for a small brand. At the D&AD Awards 2019, 'Legal-ade' won Pencils in PR, Direct and Integrated. What's more, the summer of 2019 saw the concept expanded, as Country Time campaigns stop at nothing to 'Legalise Lemonade'.