Opportunity: The Big Mac was celebrating it’s 50th anniversary.
Work: We took inspiration from The Economist’s Big Mac Index (which uses Big Macs to measure the purchasing power of global currencies) and launched the MacCoin—a real, physical currency that stood out during the height of the 2018 crypto craze. It became world’s first fully food back currency, with each of the 6 million MacCoins being worth one Big Mac in over 50 countries.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Mike D’Amico, Ron D’innocenzo, Geoff McCartney
Awards: Cannes Gold Lion / PR Multi-market Campaign, Cannes Silver Lion / PR Effectiveness, Silver Clio / PR, SABRE / Global Award Winner, SABRE / Finalist Best Content Creation for Media Sites (Earned),
Opportunity: Kinda weird to call 2020’s Covid Quarantine an “opportunity”, but, uhhh, here we are?
Work: I asked myself what some of the world’s most iconic paintings would look like if their subjects were under quarantine orders as well… and this is what came out.
The images were shared globally across social media, network television, local magazines, featured as Creativity’s Pick of the Day, and even shared by the Art Institute of Chicago. And over 100 high res print files were given out for free, we just asked recipients donated to local food shelters / restaurants/ relief funds.
Oh, and zero generative or Adobe AI was used in the retouching, all photoshopping was done by me and my trusty trackpad.
Agency: Personal (Four First Names)
Team: Drake Paul, Gerald Lewis, John McNeil Studio
Opportunity: Domino’s was struggling with meeting the demand for delivery, so they decided to relaunch their tips campaign, and needed a fresh way to encourage customers to come pick up their pizzas.
Work: Our data showed that almost every family or group of friends has that one person who typically goes and picks up the order. And when everyone else stays seated, they rise. So, we recognized these selfless and brave Carryout Heroes and tipped them $3 for helping those in need… of pizza.
Agency: WIP_
Team: Tom Oubre, Drake Paul, D’Arcy O’Neill, Kelly McCormick
Opportunity: McDonald’s was finally launching All Day Breakfast—something fans had been asking for for years.
Work: The People’s Launch—Instead of just pitching the news to media outlets and letting them have all of the fun, we decided to take to Twitter and let our fans be the first to know. We dug back years to the very first tweets requesting All Day Breakfast and responded to the years-old-posts, and then let the internet (and media) do the rest.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Mike D’Amico, Ron D’Innocenzo, Geoff McCartney, Ananta Prayitno, Vince Patton, Jamon Deaver
Awards:
SABRE / Global Sabre Award Winner, SABRE / Best in Show #1, SABRE / Consumer Marketing (Best Product), SABRE / Best Use Of Facebook, Twitter Or Linkedin, PRWeek Awards / 2017 Campaign of the Year, PRWeek Awards / Best in Social Media, PRWeek Awards / Best Consumer Launch
Opportunity: Dairy Queen was looking to do a soft rebrand, with the goal of breathing a more modern tone, look and feel into the American classic.
Work: Here are a few commercials that reflect the new look and tone of the brand
Agency: SPCSHP
Team: Tom Oubre, Christine Gratton, Kyle Heiner, Cori Leeds
Opportunity: McDonald’s asked us to promote a new shake that was half chocolate and half Shamrock. But, there were two problems. The shake news wasn’t breaking through (outside of food media) and the layered drink created a unique drinking issue—you could only get one flavor at a time.
Work: We partnered with fluid dynamic engineers at NK labs to create the STRAW, a patented device that delivers the perfect ratio of chocolate and mint flavors. And if you’re wondering if it works with a Dark N’ Stormy, yes… yes it does.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Mike D’Amico
Awards: SABRE Finalist / Best Content Creation For Media Sites (earned)
Opportunity: “Yodel Boy” aka Mason Ramsey was going viral for yodeling in a Walmart. It was basically one of those silver platter moments that brand social teams pray for (and I was lucky enough to be running the social team at the time).
Work: The Walmart social team jumped in right away, and offered to host his first ever concert live on Twitter from his hometown of Harrisburg, IL. Special thanks to Buzzfeed for joining along, and creating this excellent recap video.
Agency: Golin, Tombras
Team: Drake Paul, Mitch Delaplane, Aileen Driscoll
Awards: Webby Finalist / Real Time Response
Opportunity: 2019 marked 40 years of the Happy Meal.
Work: We decided to bring back some of the most iconic toys in a special “Surprise Happy Meal” to join in on the celebration. The limited edition rereleases could be found in Happy Meals worldwide throughout the 40th anniversary celebration.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Ron D’Innocenzo, Vince Patton, Ananta Prayitno
Awards: SABRE / Global Campaign Shortlist, PRWeek / Best in Global Effort
Opportunity: Domino’s was launching a CarPlay app so they could compete with traditional drive-throughs.
Work: When you're out running around and start to feel hungry, your options are pretty much all the same. You can get a burger, a burger, or maybe a burger. But a pizza from Domino’s can be ready just as fast. So, why not skip the burger and get pizza instead? We created a 360 campaign featuring commercials, social, and an influencer partnership with Backyard Racing.
Agency: WIP_
Team: Tom Oubre, Drake Paul, D’Arcy O’Neill, Kelly McCormick
Opportunity: McDonald’s was bringing back their Big Mac sizes for Valentine’s Day, but it was old news and they needed to break through the holiday clutter
Work: We partnered with up and coming jewelry designer Nadine Ghosn to craft this ridiculous 7-layer ring (one layer for each ingredient) and gave it away to the person who tweeted the most romantic love letter to the iconic burger.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Mike D’Amico
Awards: Sabre Finalist / Best Use of Gamification/User-Generated Contests
Opportunity: Humana partnered with the National Parks and needed us to help them get the word out.
Work: We created Humana Senior Skip Day, a day that encouraged seniors—65+, not high school Seniors—to get out and enjoy the health benefits of the parks for free.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Geoff McCartney
Awards: SABRE Awards / Best Sponsorship, Gold Cause Marketing Halo Award / Best Video Campaign Category “The Check Up”
Opportunity: In 2017 popular cartoon Rick and Morty mentioned McDonald’s Szechuan Sauce in one of their episodes, and that bringing it back is the entire goal of one of the characters.
Work: This launched a multi year campaign (done in partnership with WAU) that encompassed sending sauce to the show’s creators, making limited amounts of the sauce available in-stores (which caused border-line riots due to the extremely limited quantities), McDonald’s apologizing for said riots, Deadmau5 paying $15k for a jug of the sauce, bringing the sauce back again a year later to launch the new Buttermilk Crispy Tenders, creating collectible posters screen-printed using the actual sauce, and finally releasing a 3-part podcast about the entire saucy-saga… sauce!
If you have an hour to kill, you can listen to episode 1 here, 2 here, and 3 here.
Agency: Golin, DDB x We Are Unlimited
Team: Drake Paul, Ananta Prayitno, Zach Tarvin, Tom Glass, Lara Unnerstall, Mike D’Amico
Awards: One Show Branded Entertainment / Bronze Pencil (for the work done in partnership with WAU), Webby / People’s Voice Best Branded Podcast or Segment (Features), Discover Pods Awards / Nominee Best Branded Podcast
Opportunity: Essilor, the world’s largest manufacturer of glasses lenses, wanted to bring awareness to near-sightedness in children.
Work: We created a short animated film showing what life with near-sightedness looks like through the eyes of a 12 year old girl. We played it in theaters before children’s movies to encourage conversations between parents and children.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Zach Schmitz
Opportunity: McDonald’s was offering two new sizes for the Big Mac and needed to get the news to break through outside of traditional food outlets.
Work: We decided that the best way to get the news out was to put our press release somewhere unmissable—right on the label of 10,000 limited edition bottles of Big Mac sauce. As part of the give away, we created an escape room experience that ran live simultaneously on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram—a first of it’s kind social activation for any brand.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Mike D’Amico
Opportunity: Gulden’s became the official mustard of the Chicago Cubs and wanted to cement their status as the go-to mustard for every Chicago Dog.
Work: We partnered with a few local icons—The Pink Hat Guy and The Wiener’s Circle—to make sure that when people think of Chicago Dogs, they think of Gulden’s.
Agency: Golin
Team: Drake Paul, Mitch Delaplane
Awards: The nice woman working at The Wiener’s Circle called me a “sad boy loser”, that’s gotta count for something, right?
