An Unlikely Understudy: JUST Egg

All work exhibited is my own, and not affiliated with Eat JUST Inc. Written in my 2nd year at University.

The Challenge: reposition plant-based food

Changing someone’s mind. Easier said than done.

Grim glances at the Edelman Trust Barometer is a rough way to start any day. Although not surprising, when consumers act as cannon fodder for the ever-increasing plethora of brand touchpoints.

Jeremy Bullmore was right in saying that “people build brands as birds build nests, from scraps and straws we chance upon.” But, when overwhelmed with scraps and straws of indecent devising, a brand runs the risk of losing the ever-lusted authenticity, which consumers crave. Perhaps the best way to change someone’s mind isn’t through subliminal scraps and straws (touchpoints), but a truthful conversation.

A painfully simple idea, but one worth exploring.

I’ve always struggled with the branding of “vegan” or “alternative” products. By marketing yourself as an alternative or even replacement, you take on the role of the understudy. With all due respect to understudies, there is a reason Broadway shows only notify the audience of the change once you’re already clutching a playbill. Demanding a refund is a lot more difficult when in your seat and the lights begin to dim.

The puzzling part of this is that plant-based products are, on the whole, more sustainable, better nutritionally, and have this elusive quality of being new and on-trend. Why advertise the future as the understudy? Why not advertise it as the new show in town?

Eat JUST Inc. is an exciting company out of silicon valley that produces products which challenge what plant-based food is and can be. The product, JUST Egg, is the result of a discovery that the mung bean has a protein which scrambles, and tastes, just like an egg. Better still, the mung bean has been in agricultural production for thousands of years.

The adverts shown are a possible solution to consumer stage fright for plant-based products. The goal isn’t simply to coerce and drag consumers into the land of sustainability and niceness, but change consumer perspectives on what a plant-based product is. Simply buying something because it’s right, is not enough.

The campaign, “Truth Told”, introduces the viewer to the idea that this product is the next step in food, the new show in town. New can be intimidating, therefore the campaign uses well-known adages to allow the consumer to arrive at this new idea within a comfortable, funny and familiar environment.

This starts a conversation. A conversation tailored to cultivate trust and authenticity with the listener, for the benefit of the brand. Slowly introducing the idea of truth and transparency mitigates any risk of coming off as a PR stunt or radical truth-telling. Allowing for enormous scale as to future brand transparency, authenticity and most importantly, trust-laden relationships with consumers.

The new show in town has infinite possibilities as to where the conversation is directed. This starts a truthful one.

Product benefits/supports are intentionally left off, with the blank space at the bottom reserved to act as a canvas for any hashtags, messages or calls to action the client wishes to get across (ie: "100% Plants", "ALA Approved (Alarming Lack of Animals)", "Closest this gets to animals is the bloke who harvests it" or "See if you can tell the difference, we can't")