Tag: CPG
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Kroger Launches AI-Powered Agent Monday for CPG Brands
Kroger’s media and data science division, powered by 84.51°, is giving CPG brand partners a little extra time back in their Mondays by launching Agent Monday—an AI-generated email digest tailored specifically for category managers. The weekly report taps into Kroger’s Stratum platform to deliver automatically curated performance insights covering everything from last week’s household trends…
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Claritin Gets a Lift from a Smarter Algorithm
Bayer is pulling its programmatic strategy tighter to home, bringing control of its custom ad-buying algorithm in-house and into Snowflake’s data clean room. Partnering with Chalice AI, Bayer now runs its model inside its own data ecosystem—one that includes media, creative, and commerce info—without shifting sensitive files all over the place. Previously, integrating the algorithm…
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How AI Helped Corona Cero Find Its Olympic Chill
Corona Cero had just three weeks to craft a global Olympic campaign—and decided that traditional tear-jerkers about sacrifice and national pride weren’t going to cut it. As the first-ever worldwide beer sponsor of the Games, the nonalcoholic brand leaned into its laid-back DNA, using AI to uncover emotional insights that felt distinctly more beach than…
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Kind Is Letting AI Taste-Test Its Message Before You Do
Kind snack bars is going all-in on generative AI to cut costs and move faster—because apparently, granola bars aren’t the only thing they want to streamline. Facing pressure to break through with Gen Z and outmaneuver private label competitors, Kind’s marketing team has shortened its creative testing window from months to mere days, using tools…
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How Reckitt Harnesses AI for Brand Performance
Reckitt isn’t immune to the hype around generative AI—but unlike many marketers jumping on the bandwagon, they’re running a tight ship focused on practical wins. With 95% of AI pilots reportedly failing (per MIT), the consumer goods brand structured its approach around one question: which repetitive tasks can actually benefit from AI without diving headfirst…
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How Kellanova Leverages AI to Boost Snack Brands’ Creative Performance
Kellanova, the marketer behind snack staples like Pringles, Pop-Tarts, and Cheez-It, is using AI not to dream up its next campaign, but to fine-tune creative that actually drives results. Partnering with Vidmob and MMA Global, the company analyzed 443 creative assets that ran on Meta platforms—and sifted through billions of impressions—to pinpoint which creative features…
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Netflix and Chilled: AB InBev Pours Into Streamer’s Pop Culture Pipeline
AB InBev is trading ad interruptions for screen time, serving up its beer brands—like Bud Light and Stella Artois—directly within Netflix programming through a new, multi-year global partnership. From British crime capers like The Gentlemen to cooking competitions in South Korea, the brewer will integrate brands into storylines and settings where a cold one might…
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Three Seconds to Sell: Kellanova’s AI Test Drive in Creative Effectiveness
Kellanova is leveraging AI to enhance its advertising creative through a year-long collaboration with Vidmob and MMA Global. By analyzing 443 assets across ten brands, the company optimized elements to capture attention, resulting in a 2x view-through rate and an 11% ROI increase on AI-scored assets. Additionally, predictive models for sweet and salty products demonstrated…
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Weber Ranch Vodka’s AI Wants to Mix You a Drink
Weber Ranch 1902 Vodka has launched “Tex,” a chatbot bartender powered by OpenAI’s ChatGPT, available via SMS or web. Tex provides personalized cocktail recipes based on pantry ingredients, interprets photos, and plans big-batch cocktails. Aimed at tech-savvy at-home drinkers, Tex enhances the vodka brand’s market presence amidst industry challenges.
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Chips Ahoy Enters the Upside Down with ‘Stranger Things’ AR Game
Chips Ahoy is diving into the “Stranger Things” multiverse just in time for the show’s final season by launching an augmented reality (AR) game hidden within its cookie packaging. Starting August 11, fans who scan on-pack QR codes or visit a dedicated microsite can unlock a digital Upside Down, where they search for virtual cookies…
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PepsiCo CMO on the importance of AI skills
In a chat recorded at Cannes, PepsiCo Beverages U.S. CMO Mark Kirkham made one thing clear: stagnation isn’t an option in the beverage world. “Innovate or die” isn’t just a catchphrase—it’s the guiding principle behind moves like the recent acquisition of prebiotic soda brand Poppi. Kirkham sees innovation not just in chasing new trends, but…
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Weetos Launches Virtual Family Fun on Roblox
Weetos, the playful cereal brand under Weetabix Food Company, is jumping into the digital sandbox with “Weetos World,” a gamified experience on Roblox built in partnership with Fandom. Aimed squarely at kids (and their probably very competitive parents), the project features puzzles, creative zones, and collaborative challenges wrapped inside a virtual world. More than just…
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Soap Gets an AI Glow-Up
Unilever went viral with a cookie-scented Dove body care line after deploying a hybrid strategy of AI-powered content creation and a massive influencer push. With plans to scale its influencer roster by up to 20x, Unilever is using AI to generate thousands of branded assets each week—versus the trickle it used to produce monthly. That…
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How Unilever and IPG Studios are Reinventing Creative Production with AI
Unilever is swapping storyboards and long lead times for something a little more real-time. The CPG juggernaut just launched Sketch Pro, an in-house design hub built to crank out social-first creative at triple the current speed. Partnering with IPG Studios, Unilever is tapping into generative AI tools like Adobe Firefly and Google’s Veo 3 to…
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May the Fizz Be With You: Coke Powers Up with Star Wars Fans
Coca-Cola is leaning hard into AR, cosplay and collective nostalgia with its “Refresh Your Galaxy” campaign, teaming up with Star Wars for a fandom-fueled activation that feels more Comic-Con than CPG. At the heart of the launch is a brand film starring fans decked out as Jedi and Sith who turn a screening interrupted by…
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🔥 When the Heat Is On, Sprite Hits the Street
Sprite is using rising temperatures as a marketing trigger—literally. Weather-based targeting is not a new concept, but interesting to see the growth in adoption here. The Coca-Cola-owned brand launched a digital out-of-home (DOOH) campaign that activates when the mercury rises, serving chill reminders to consumers in places like Rome, London, Seoul, and beyond to grab…
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AdAge Top 5 AI Activations June ’25
In the latest roundup of AI-infused campaigns, brands and organizations are getting a lot more expressive—and introspective—with their use of artificial intelligence. Google’s Veo 3 has stolen some thunder with its realistic, lip-synced video dialogue, tested out in an adrenaline-laced Moncler film by R/GA. Meanwhile, nonprofit Save the Children Romania took a heavier route with…
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Even the Mom in This Ad Knows She’s Fake
Ritual isn’t trying to pass off AI-generated people as the real deal—in fact, they’re leaning into the falseness. The supplement brand’s latest campaign, whipped up by Giant Spoon using Google’s brand-new Veo 3 AI video platform, features avatars who flat-out admit they’re not real. One such pixel-perfect mom cradles her twin babies and informs viewers,…
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The AI Teammate That Doubled as a Coach
Turns out, AI isn’t just a digital intern—it’s pulling weight like a seasoned pro. In a P&G and Wharton field study, GPT-4 helped junior staff perform at near-expert levels and single-handedly reproduced the output of entire teams, all without inflating costs or workloads. The kicker? Participants using AI were three times more likely to deliver…
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Heineken Taps AI to Keep It Local, Even at Global Scale
Heineken may be one of the world’s oldest beer brands, but it’s not letting legacy slow it down. With hundreds of local markets to manage, the challenge isn’t just modernization—it’s doing it without flattening local flavor. That’s where connected intelligence, enterprise architecture modularity, and IBM muscle come in. Heineken’s digital and tech chief, Ronald den…
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Coke’s AI Agent Dishes Out 828,000 Coupons—Hold the Human
Coca-Cola took a hands-off approach to its latest campaign in Saudi Arabia by letting an AI agent do all the heavy lifting—about 8 million autonomous actions, to be exact. Built by Cluep, the AI scoured posts across platforms like TikTok, Reddit, and LinkedIn looking for fast food-loving consumers, then matched them to mobile IDs and…
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Newman’s Own Hits Fast-Forward With GenAI
Newman’s Own, the CPG brand best known for giving 100% of its profits to help children, is proving that doing good doesn’t mean moving slow. The 50-person team is leveraging Microsoft 365 Copilot to speed up daily tasks across departments — from slashing legal research time to supercharging content generation. According to the company, the…
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Fizzion Statement: Coca-Cola’s AI Makes Sure the Logo Stays in Line
Coca-Cola’s latest brand play isn’t another seasonal can or TikTok dance—it’s an AI named Fizzion. Born from the chaos of trying to manage 5,000 assets per campaign across 200 countries, Fizzion acts as a brand compliance co-pilot baked directly into Adobe’s design tools. Instead of designers thumbing through 400-page guidelines or risking logo abuse (stretching,…
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Welch’s Uses AI to Freshen Up Lunchbox Notes
Welch’s Fruit Snacks is giving parents a digital upgrade for one of the oldest lunchbox traditions—the handwritten note. With help from AI, the brand’s new “Lunchbox Notes Translator” turns simple parent messages into witty, warm, or playfully rephrased sentiments. Available for a limited time, writable Welch’s pouches now include QR codes that link to this…
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Bad View? Have a Brew: Coors Light Turns AI into a Beer Delivery System
Coors Light is stepping up for baseball fans—literally the ones stuck behind poles or nosebleed seats—with a new campaign that uses AI to offer compensation in the form of cold beer. The brand launched “The Coors Light AI Beer Refund,” a program that uses computer vision to detect obstructed-view seats in user-submitted photos. Fans can…
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Fizz Boom Pow: Mentos Weaponizes Its Brand in Fortnite
Mentos is bringing the explosive energy of its classic soda experiment to Fortnite with the debut of the Fizzooka—a branded rocket launcher designed exclusively for Fortnite Creative mode. Developed with BBH London and gaming agency Metavision, the Fizzooka is more than just a gimmick; it’s the first branded tactical item integrated into the game’s sandbox…
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Scan, Watch, Buy: How Mondelez Turned CTV into a Snackable Checkout
Mondelez International gave its Nabisco brand a digital touchdown during the 2024 football season with a CTV campaign that went beyond eyeballs—it drove straight to carts. Running from mid-August to mid-October, the campaign used QR codes embedded in connected TV ads to send viewers directly to Walmart.com, where the featured snacks were instantly added to…
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Crazy Water and TRG Promote Dry January with an AI-generated Cowboy
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AI in Ads: The Hits and Misses, According to Humans
As AI continues to reshape advertising, some brands are nailing the blend of technology and creativity, while others are stumbling into the uncanny valley. According to a report from SEO automation platform Chadix, Nike, Coca-Cola, and Samsung were among those that used AI effectively, while brands like Toys “R” Us and Mango faced backlash. Nike’s…
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Panadol Uses AI to Make Its Ads More Inclusive—And It’s Paying Off
More than half of consumers don’t feel culturally represented in advertising, and Panadol, the Haleon-owned pain relief brand, is taking that insight seriously. Partnering with AI platform CreativeX, Panadol is leveraging the Health Inclusivity Screener, a tool that analyzes digital ad creative for diversity, accessibility, and representation. The AI scans visuals for factors like gender,…
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HIGHLIGHTS: November 2024
November was an interesting month, punctuated for me by a nasty wind storm that ripped through the Seattle area, knocking out power for roughly half a million people in the area. We were without power for 4 days. When reliable high-speed connectivity gets scarce, it becomes clear how reliant on it most of us have…
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PepsiCo Expands Multi-year Partnership with EA Sports
PepsiCo and EA have announced an expansion of their partnership, integrating Gatorade into EA Sports FC Mobile for the first time. This collaboration extends PepsiCo’s existing presence in EA Sports FC, which began on console game platforms. Gatorade branding will now feature across in-game assets such as ad boards and virtual cooling equipment, alongside existing…
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How Pernod Ricard is Redefining Work with AI
Pernod Ricard, a global leader in the spirits industry, is not just blending fine liquors but also data and AI as part of a major workforce transformation. Traditionally known for brands like Jameson and Absolut, the company has shifted focus to operationalizing AI across its business. Central to this effort are tools like D-STAR, which…
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Coca-Cola continues its deep dive into GenAI with new Holiday TV spots
Coca-Cola has launched its first AI-driven holiday TV commercials, leveraging generative AI to reimagine its iconic “Holidays Are Coming” campaign from 1995. Collaborating with AI studios like Secret Level, Silverside AI, and Wild Card, Coca-Cola developed three distinct versions of the ad, tailored for global broadcast across various platforms. Instead of traditional filming, AI tools…
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Scoring Big: How AI-Powered CTV Ads Are Changing Live Sports Marketing
DraftKings and Dr Pepper are leaning into Perion’s AI-powered Stay Live advertising format, a technology designed to seamlessly integrate ads into live sports broadcasts on CTV. Stay Live employs artificial intelligence to analyze live broadcast streams, identifying optimal ad placement moments with high viewer engagement and minimal interruption—like replays of major game moments. The format,…
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Disconnect to Reconnect: Heineken’s ‘Boring Mode’ Puts Phones on Mute for IRL Moments
Heineken’s new “Boring Mode” campaign, developed with Publicis’ LePub, is transforming concert experiences by encouraging attendees to unplug from their devices. Through an app that blocks notifications, shuts down camera functions, and disables certain apps for set periods, Heineken aims to enhance real-world connections during live events. To promote the app, the brand used infrared…