Jet-Puffed is revitalizing its 70-year-old identity with a bold new creative employing dark humor, “Love ’Em to Death.” Developed in collaboration with agency Gut, the campaign features a cast of cheerful, animated marshmallows who find purpose in being skewered, toasted, and squished for consumer enjoyment while the Nazareth “Love Hurts” audio track explains it all.
The launch of “Love ’Em to Death” :55 follows an early teaser campaign on the Las Vegas Sphere, signaling a departure from traditional baking staple advertising toward a bolder visual language to differentiate the brand.
Here’s what iSpot’s Creative Assessment platform revealed on actual viewer response to the spot.
The Details:
- “Love ‘Em to Death” very successfully broke through the clutter, delivering Attention in the very top percentile and Likeability in the 90th:
- The ad’s character-driven narrative and distinct, Arresting visual style resonated deeply with viewers, driving impressive engagement metrics, with a high level of Love It response seen as well as incredulity. In fact, emotionality was broad across many positive reactions from Curiosity and Funny to Nostalgic and Ingenious. The characters (16% rated the Single Best Thing vs 10% benchmark) and visuals (29% vs 16%) both made disproportionately strong impressions on viewers vs the average staples ad over the past year, with the “Love Hurts” music (14% vs 5%) sending it over the top.
- With above-norm Change recognition, Jet-Puffed succeeded in standing apart in the category as a result of this spot and Desire was planted. Just under seven in ten successfully recalled the Jet-Puffed brand (unaided) after a single view (normative level) with some generic marshmallow recalls seen. Enhanced branding and/or shorter cuts that bring the brand forward could continue to help cement the brand as unique and favored.
- Viewers 36+ were strong fans of the new :55 while those 21-35 were a bit less enthusiastic but still responded at norm levels. Persuasion was quite strong, with an impressive two in three reporting increased likelihood of purchasing Jet-Puffed as a result of the ad (besting category norms by +11 pts).
- The ad’s character-driven narrative and distinct, Arresting visual style resonated deeply with viewers, driving impressive engagement metrics, with a high level of Love It response seen as well as incredulity. In fact, emotionality was broad across many positive reactions from Curiosity and Funny to Nostalgic and Ingenious. The characters (16% rated the Single Best Thing vs 10% benchmark) and visuals (29% vs 16%) both made disproportionately strong impressions on viewers vs the average staples ad over the past year, with the “Love Hurts” music (14% vs 5%) sending it over the top.
- Second-by-second trace results show the immediate engagement achieved by both the audio track and opening product reveal. Although viewers showed a bit of concern when the knife came out, they quickly got on board with the concept after that scene and remained highly engaged throughout the long-form ad:
- Viewers 21-35 were the toughest to engage but still tracked within normative ranges (the shaded area). iSpot is a non-skippable testing environment so as to measure response to the full creative as it was intended to be viewed.
- Enthusiastic viewer sentiment on “Love ‘Em to Death” indicates that the dark humor approach paired with ‘humanized’ marshmallows being “tortured” resonated strongly and differentiated Jet-Puffed in a commodity category while driving both brand affinity and purchase intent. Of course, a small portion found it (or the “Love ‘Em to Death” tagline) disturbing, particularly given the child skew perceived for the product. Still, most were won over by the sheer creativity and entertainment value.
- Animation quality and character design (and naming) received consistent praise and the nostalgic Nazareth “Love Hurts” song was repeatedly cited as perfect for the context. Positive memories of camping, family time, and childhood were successfully triggered, earning multi-generational appeal.
- The ad also successfully educated consumers about product applications they hadn’t considered to drive immediate purchase intent.
- Viewers 21-35 were the toughest to engage but still tracked within normative ranges (the shaded area). iSpot is a non-skippable testing environment so as to measure response to the full creative as it was intended to be viewed.
Sample comments on the “Love ‘Em to Death” :50
“That was honestly one of the coolest and most entertaining ads I’ve seen in a while.”
Male 36-49
“The philosophical mixing of death and love, in such a cute way, was amazing.”
Male 36-49
“I thought the ad was so adorable. It honestly made me smile, up until the end. For some reason, ‘love them to death’ rubbed me the wrong way and I was disappointed that’s how it ended. Up until then, I loved it.”
Female 36-49
“Now this was a great ad! The music got my attention first and the marshmallow characters were awesome. I was even trying to figure out what their names would be before they came on. I got Duncan right! And the tie-in – love ‘em to death – this was a creative masterpiece. And I’m currently drinking coffee wishing I had a marshmallow to go in it!”
Male 36-49
“The ad is very catchy. The graphics are amazing. It’s an ad that would catch people of all ages’ attention. Very unique and creative. I loved it.”
Female 36-49
“The shock value of me watching little smiling marshmallows getting brutally ‘hurt ‘? Questioning because they seem to enjoy it but we as humans know these are a bit rough conditions. A funny take of dark humor, very satire for an older audience.”
Male 21-35
“I really enjoyed the ad. I like how it showed the different ways everyone uses marshmallows or showed how you could use marshmallows. The song was an amazing fit to the advertisement. It was also a great choice to have the marshmallow animated instead of just a regular one.”
Female 21-35
“It looks AI generated. That’s an immediate no from me. NEVER do AI generated ads. Put real care into them and the viewers will notice and be more willing to care about the product.”
Male 21-35
“This is hilarious and adorably cute. The soundtrack is killer. It isn’t trying too hard. It puts something back in your head you haven’t thought of in a while. Winner.”
Female 36-49
“I found it a bit uncomfortable putting faces on the marshmallow (humanizing it) and then showing ways to destroy them. Considering the target audience is children, the ad is a bit off.”
Female 50+
“I thought that it was cute and appealing. It definitely made me want to go get some marshmallows and roast them. I think it’s going to grab the attention of children and parents and I hope you guys are going to be making figurines out of those little marshmallows because I would most indubitably love to collect them myself.”
Female 36-49
“I think it’s definitely a different way to advertise marshmallows and very entertaining to see. I loved it all around lol.”
Male 21-35
“It’s nostalgic and very creative with the animations. The song playing was perfect because it’s from my time and with the cartoon effects on the marshmallow, it could market to young and old as marshmallows can be a comfort food or good memory for anyone of any age.”
Male 36-49
“Wow!!! This was a great ad for JetPuffed Marshmallows, but so tragic and makes me think about how cruel we really are to the likes of poor Burnie and Melton and the others. I think we as a society should reflect more on the mistreatment of our marshmallow colleagues. I’m just kidding, seriously I’m gonna go make me a Burnie!!”
Male 36-49
- While “Love ‘Em to Death” could have run in the Super Bowl, it easily outpaced Hellmann’s SBLX “Meal Diamond” – as well as standing on solid ground vs top-received staples ads from the past year:
- The brand’s :55 spot stood out for its ability to convert entertainment into intent.
- “Love ‘Em to Death” significantly outperformed Hellmann’s SB spot in breakthrough metrics, boasting a massive advantage in Attention (+101 pts vs +12 for Hellmann’s) and Likeability (+62 pts v. +1). Crucially, Jet-Puffed also drove far higher purchase intent (67%) compared to Hellmann’s (47%, although mayo is admittedly polarizing) as well as Nestle and one Pillsbury spot.
- The spot’s reliance on visuals was unique among the set but Pillsbury managed to convey Information more directly, driving high Desire.
- The brand’s :55 spot stood out for its ability to convert entertainment into intent.
- A relative weakness among younger viewers could be linked to the longer length of “Love ‘Em to Death,” suggesting opportunity to test shorter forms aimed at more impatient and/or distracted viewers:
Ineffective creative, even if delivered to the right audience, results in missed opportunity and performance shortfalls. Great creative delivered poorly also results in failed campaigns.
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Creative Agency: GUT Miami