| Philosophie | Every year on 5th October, Russians celebrate their children‘s teachers on Teacher’s Day, traditionally gifting them boxes of chocolates. Serviceplan Russia teamed up with Cherkizovo, leading Russian Producers of meat products, to put a unique spin on the traditional chocolate-giving, switching chocolates for ham with a new product named ‘Hamcolates’. There are many different holidays in Russia, but it seems like there is one main gift that is given on every single one of them: chocolates, chocolates, chocolates. In Russia, traditionally more than 68% people choose chocolate for a gift, especially as a thankful gesture to teachers. So Teachers get swamped with chocolate boxes every autumn at the start of the school term, and with 1,225,000 teachers in Russia, that equates to a mountain of chocolates! The unconventional ‘Hamcolates’ product was launched by Cherkizovo in Russia on Teacher’s Day, 5th October 2020. Serviceplan Russia devised the concept of Cherkizovo’s new Hamcolates product, creating a packaging design in the style of a box of chocolates, but this time the box contained ham instead of chocolate. This assorted ham packaged in the style of a chocolate box was launched with a bang: just before Teacher’s Day, Serviceplan Russia seeded videos on social media representing Whats App chats of parents and teachers, which sparked a discussion about the not-so-sweet chocolates and created a social media buzz which people started sharing instantly. Immediately after Teacher’s Day, Cherkizovo launched ‘Candy Trade-in’, which invited teachers to exchange unwanted chocolates for brand-new packs of Hamcolates in O’KEY supermarkets. 550 boxes of unwanted chocolates were exchanged for Hamcolates in 2 days. After the launch, Hamcolates started an smm campaign challenging any occasion for sweet gifts while offering the alternative solution of giving meat gifts in an ironic way. Maybe one day, meats really will become the new sweets. |