Making fresh food available for more kids

Subway partners with Food Banks Canada to provide  fresh food to children during the critical summer months when in -school meal programs are unavailable. Their Never Miss Lunch flagship event raises funds towards this important cause by donating $1 out of every footlong sold nationwide towards Never Miss Lunch initiatives. 

With food banks seeing its highest usage in Canadian history in 2022, and Canadians tightening their belts in light of a recession, Subway needed a powerful new brand positioning to drive in-store traffic on June 21 and getting Canadians behind this noble cause.

The Insight

In Canada, 1 out of 3 food banks clients are children. The effects of children going hungry extends beyond hunger pangs and grumbling stomachs. While fed kids worry about problems like, 'Does she like me or like me like me?', hungry kids start worrying about problems like 'which meal should I skip today?' leading to a profound loss of innocence.

Insight: Child hunger starves childhood

The Strategy

[BUSINESS PROBLEM] Subway's Never Miss Lunch Day faces decreased participation as Canadian's cut back on discretionary spending

[CONSUMER PROBLEM] Problem is, many Canadians don't think that world hunger is a Canadian issue leading to a lack of urgency

[INSIGHT] However, child hunger starves childhood

[SOLUTION] We need to tell Canadians that kids deserve kid problems, not hunger problems

[CONSUMER GOAL] So that Canadians see buying a footlong sub on Never Miss Lunch Day as an essential expense and not a financial burden

[BUSINESS GOAL] Raising funds for Never Miss Lunch Day

The Idea

Celebrating the problems kids should be having instead of hunger problems.

The Execution

Mass channels of TV, OLV, Social and Radio were used to celebrate all the charming kid problems Subway wants to celebrate instead of hunger problems.

Loyalty channels and the Subway mobile app were used to push reminders leading up to and on Never Miss Lunch Day to drive in-store traffic. 

The Results

1. Increased footlong sub sales by 14% WoW

2. Generated 25.5M media impressions

3. 185,000 nutritious food packs distributed to hungry kids with help of funds raised from Never Miss Lunch