Context

During winter, the ice cream category suffers as people choose not to consume this frozen treat when it gets cold. From August to January, the ice cream volume sales drop more than half in the UK (Kantar Ice Cream Volume Sales UK 2023).

 As the category leader, Magnum’s business has been affected by this challenging reality year after year, with penetration dropping. We wanted to change this. More than a business challenge, this was a leadership challenge.

Our insight

In the UK, the average daily sun hours is just 2.4 hours during January (Magnum Europanel Q4’2023) and so during winter people are deprived from most of life’s greatest pleasures: outdoor activities, the sun, the feeling of warmth on your skin, and importantly…ice cream. In fact, 4 in 10 Brits feel unhappier in winter than they do during summer (British Gas Proprietary Research 2019), leading us to a clear insight: When people need pleasure the most, it’s also when they are least able to enjoy it.

Our strategy: building on new moments of pleasure

LOLA has been building Magnum’s True to Pleasure platform for over 15 years now and we continue to build on new moments of pleasure. In this campaign, we wanted to inspire people to seek these small moments of pleasure, even during winter. Most days can feel dark and cold, but a ray of sunlight and a Magnum ice cream, can help you find your way back to pleasure.

A creative solution, using data

The 90 second film ‘Find Your Summer’, directed by Juan Cabral, encourages everyone to seek out those small, narrow, fleeting moments of sunshine amid the harsh winter and relish them while enjoying a Magnum.

The film is accompanied by OOH, shot by Ale Burset, and DOOH that identifies specific locations using real-time weather data, where moments of sunshine can be found. We developed an Application Programming Interface (API) to connect to weather services, identifying the sun's position in real-time and its impact on the ground within a radius of 1 to 2 kilometers from the billboard, showing the three nearest locations where people would be able to find their summers. Additionally, each billboard was equipped with beacons that sent people push notifications to the nearest store where they could get a Magnum with a discount reward.

Breaking all the usual ice cream category conventions, Find Your Summer is shot during winter, in black and white and scarcely showing the product. It’s a testament to the strength of the True to Pleasure positioning and its ability to create unique campaigns to answer specific business challenges, while also being true to the brand’s positioning.

Serious things happened

We're delighed that the campaign has received recognition in every festival it has participated in, winning gold, silver, and bronze at Clio, One Show, and D&AD awards.

And hot off the press! The campaign also won a Grand Prix at Cannes Lions 2024 and two Gold Lions in the Outdoor and Print & Publishing category.

But most importantly, Magnum had it's highest low season of all time.