AdMiration feature: Snickers’ “Welcome Aboard the Hungry Skies”

For this week’s AdMiration feature, we researched Snickers’ “Welcome Aboard the Hungry Skies.” The ad is based on their “You’re not you when you’re hungry” campaign — which has been running for almost 15 years! — with the first ad featuring Betty White coming out in 2010 during the Super Bowl. 

Read on to get our 3-2-1 snapshot of the ad (3 facts, 2 learnings and 1 reflection) and learn how their ad was received based on our data.

The ad opens to an elderly woman stuck in a middle seat on a plane, desperately trying to press her flight attendant call button with her cane. She turns to the camera and says, “I know it’s not easy dealing with us..” as she continues to stab at the call button repeatedly. 

The camera then turns to a young man who’s also seated on the plane, looking slightly sweaty and dressed in an absurd amount of layers (including hats), who says, “We refuse to pay for overweight bags.” The camera moves on to two women seated together on the plane, who are in the midst of a full-on spa and hair treatment routine — laser mask, curlers, nail polish and all — when one of them states, “Treat our seat like a personal spa.” 

Similar scenes continue, including a man talking loudly into his phone, another man petting his emotional support snake and another man getting into full on yoga poses. As chaos continues to ensue with these passengers, a flight attendant starts to pass out Snickers bars, which brings everyone down to a calmer level, with the phrase “Maybe the hungry skies just need a Snickers” appearing on screen. 

The ad closes with the elderly woman duct taped to her seat, apologizing, then concludes with the phrase, “Flight attendants we’re here for you!” and display of Snickers branded merch for flights.

3 facts

• The ad scores in the top 15% of all US ads in potential to drive short-term sales and in the top 30% in potential to drive brand equity and long-term sales. 

• Despite pertaining to a long-standing campaign, the ad feels fresh, distinctive and captivates the audience from start to finish.

• It does a great job of driving peaks of laughter while still managing to elicit an overall love reaction from the audience in relation to the brand’s role in the narrative. 

2 learnings

• Being clear on the fundamentals of a creative platform without dictating the specific execution can give a brand coherence while also enabling local resonance for ultimate success.

• Giving your brand the role of the hero can result in high levels of love directed towards the brand.

1 reflection

Can you unearth an insight that is so equally relevant to people and to your brand that it can serve as a flexible platform for communications over time, geographies and media?

“You’re not you when you’re hungry” has been running successfully for 14 years! In its first year alone, the campaign helped increase global sales of Snickers by 15.9% and grew market share in most of the markets the campaign ran. 

And the campaign is something the brand has stuck with for all these years, adding to its success. 

It’s interesting to see how the campaign has evolved. It started with more male-focused executions, but today it’s a highly inclusive campaign. The result? The landing of the idea that Snickers are for everyone. It has come a  long way from where it began in 2010.

So what makes the campaign truly effective?

• Grounded in a true consumer insight: Everyone can relate to not feeling like themselves when they are hungry.

• Insight relates to a product truth: The product has properties that truly satisfy the hunger that drives the ‘out of character’ behavior.

• Fertile territory for creative: The heart of the idea means the execution has to be grounded in out of character behavior, delivered with humor, in a scenario that is locally resonant and where Snickers is the hero. There are so many ways to execute on that idea.

• Familiar and fresh: Stories and scenarios have evolved so they feel totally fresh, but still keep the familiarity people love with the initial insight.

• Broad appeal: The brand found something everyone could relate to (inclusive camaraderie) after a time of being more “exclusively male.”

• Global platform, local execution: The idea resonates everywhere meaningfully, both within and across countries.

• Cross-platform: Works across media, from TV to digital to tweets to OOH

• Consistency: Snickers established the idea and stuck with it so now it’s truly owned and could only be for Snickers.

The ad scores in the top 5% of all US ads in potential to drive short-term sales (sales impact: 97) and in the top 15% in potential to drive brand equity and long-term sales (brand impact: 88).

While the campaign has been running for almost 15 years, this execution captured the audience’s attention (claimed attention: 4.2 vs 3.8 norm) and was seen as highly distinctive (ad distinctiveness: 4.2 vs 3.8 norm). It feels fresh and people think it has great potential to be shared online (viral potential: 65 vs 56 norm). The ad also sets the brand apart from others with a message that is unique to Snickers (brand distinctiveness: 3.9 vs 3.7 norm).

Despite not using the original tagline of “You’re not you when you’re hungry” and ending the ad with “Maybe the hungry skies just need a Snickers,” over 80% of the audience agreed the ad conveyed the messages, “Snickers satisfies your hunger” and “Feel like you again with Snickers” clearly. 

When spontaneously recalling the key message delivered by the ad, most people talked about how Snickers satisfies hunger, can provide a solution to a problem, is enjoyable and can help people relax, and some even mentioned the original campaign slogan despite it not being present.

The different characters on board the “hungry flight” entertain the audience from start to finish. It’s enjoyable (enjoyment: 4.1 vs 3.99 norm) and emotionally engaging (overall emotion: 66% vs 55% norm) significantly beyond the norm for a US ad.

The initial chaos drove a great overall laughter reaction (laughter reaction: 27% vs 7% norm) while the Snickers bars soothing everyone’s behavior left the audience with a feeling of love (love reaction: 34% vs 28% norm). The way the different parts of the ad help evoke different emotions is seen very clearly in the second-by-second reaction to it. 

People loved the humor and the sheer mayhem being caused in the flight by the passengers before the Snickers are handed out. The fact that Snickers appeases the situation leaves the audience with a sense of satisfaction and a positive feeling about the brand (brand appeal: 4.0 vs 3.9 norm). 

Here’s what they had to say about it: 

• "I really enjoyed the idea and concept, I found it very original and funny. I like the visuals and how it portrays all the types of people who are usually on airplanes. I liked the realism."

• "The ad was funny and the reality hit home because flights are stressful. A Snickers bar would be a great treat along the journey."

• "I liked how the Snickers advertisement used a creative and humorous approach to convey its message. The concept of the skies being hungry and causing chaos was very unique and memorable, making it stand out among other commercials."

• "It was creative and funny which was engaging and made me want to watch to the end. I really liked the ending and thought it was especially creative in how it tied Snickers to filling the needs of flight attendants."

• "I thought the concept and characters on the plane were funny. Everyone has been stuck in that situation before, so it was very relatable."

The ad outperformed in potential to drive a sales uplift for the brand (purchase uplift: 26% vs 20% norm). Before watching the ad, 20% of the audience would have chosen Snickers the next time they were buying chocolate or chocolate candy; after watching the ad, this rose to almost half of the audience. 

Consistency over the years can really pay off in driving mental availability for your brand, but coming up with fresh executions of your long-standing campaign will allow for it to stay relevant and capture the audience in distinctive and engaging ways. This is seen clearly with “Welcome Aboard the Hungry Skies” scoring on par with the original Super Bowl “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” ad featuring Betty White on sales and brand impact.

Snickers offers a fresh and humorous new take on their famous “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” campaign with this ad — and the audience loved every second of it! 

What did you think? Let us know by interacting with our coverage of the ad on LinkedIn.

To make sure you never miss one of our AdMiration analyses, subscribe to our LinkedIn newsletter.