Heinz Tomato Ketchup is launching its ‘Grow Your Own’ promotional campaign across the UK from March 2017.
This year (the fifth in a row the activity has run) will see more than 500,000 tomato seed packs given away to schools and consumers. The idea is that by inspiring families to grow tomatoes together and care for their very own Heinz tomato plants, Heinz reinforces the message that every bottle of its world-famous ketchup is packed full of freshly-grown delicious sun-ripened Heinz tomatoes.
Now in its fifth year, ‘Grow Your Own’ will be leveraged across multiple platforms including social media and digital advertising. New for 2017 is brand new educational programme partnering schools with the recently launched Heinz Tomato Ketchup 50% Less Sugar & Salt variant.
Committed to educating children about the importance of the journey of food from field to fork, the ‘Grow Your Own’ educational campaign will be brought to primary schools across the UK and Republic of Ireland.
Through stories and a series of fun hands-on science-led activities, pupils will explore the journey of the humble tomato, discovering all the goodness it brings to mealtimes. Schools which sign up to join the campaign will get a comprehensive guide from mid-March with printed and downloadable material to engage pupils.
A range of classroom activity sheets, seed packs and branded growing pots will support teachers looking to create a positive learning experience for children and help to deliver a core curriculum subject. Projected to drive awareness within 2,000 primary schools, the educational programme will reach more than 240,000 pupils and their families.
The first 2,000 schools which register will get 120 plant pots, 124 packets of tomato seed and supporting educational material.
In addition, 10 schools will be selected as ambassadors for the campaign, receiving £100 for gardening supplies plus free gardening equipment in return for providing regular updates on the progress of their seedlings for use on the campaign microsite, www.nationalschoolspartnership.com/growyourown.php
Schools and parents will be driven to the ‘Grow Your Own’ microsite where they can sign up to the initiative to receive Heinz tomato seeds. The campaign will also be highlighted on Facebook with an inspirational social video used to educate consumers around its core ‘Heinz Tomato Story’. The humorous video answers the question ‘Where does Heinz Tomato Ketchup come from?’ and features children from a variety of nationalities, feeding their curiosity as to how Heinz Tomato Ketchup is made.
To enhance engagement, consumers will be able to enter a variety of online competitions to win a selection of Heinz gardening merchandise.
The ‘We’ll Bottle It’ competition is also returning for 2017; consumers will be encouraged to upload pictures of their homegrown Heinz tomatoes to Facebook to be in with the chance of winning a unique personalised bottle of Heinz Tomato Ketchup, made using their own tomatoes.
The winning tomatoes will be harvested and transported to the Kraft Heinz culinary centre of excellence in Nijmegen, Netherlands where a team of expert chefs will handcraft the exclusive bottle of ketchup.
Ashley White, Marketing Manager at brand owner Kraft Heinz, comments: “The Heinz Tomato Ketchup ‘Grow Your Own’ campaign is a hands-on initiative which not only gets families involved in a fun food-based educational activity, it also helps drive core messaging that every bottle of our ketchup is packed full of delicious sun-ripened tomatoes to give it the unique flavour that consumers love time and time again.”
