Ginsters embraces farmer Merryn and her devotion to vegetables in new campaign by TBWA\London

TBWA\London has created a new campaign for the pasty brand Ginsters with a focus on using humour to drive its message in a new campaign.

Called “Taste the Effort”, the new brand platform focuses on highlighting the quality of the ingredients within a Ginsters pasty to tackle the misconception that it is a low-quality cold snack to be eaten on the go. It claims its ingredients are sourced from local and British suppliers with no added artificial colours, flavours or preservatives.

The campaign’s central protagonist is a new brand character called Merryn; a lovable, passionate, earnest, quirky farmer who goes above and beyond with the effort she puts into growing the highest quality vegetables for Ginsters.

She’s a Cornish grower, so veg is in her blood. She grew up around growing, so it’s little surprise she takes it so seriously. As other kids dreamt of moon adventures, she dreamt of ploughs, polytunnels, and asking questions such as “Do onions grow tastier if you sing them to sleep at night?” and “If I’m going to rely on worms to enrich my soil, shouldn’t I be making sure I get the best candidate of worm?”.

74% of people are unaware that vegetables in Ginsters products are grown, not only in Cornwall, but only a stone's throw from the bakery. All the meat is also 100% British.

Merryn is so devoted to living up to these standards and growing the best possible ingredients on her farm that she will go to extraordinary lengths to do so. These include dressing up and being a scarecrow, to attempting to pull an ancient and exceedingly heavy old-fashioned plough all by herself because it’s better that way.

The ad uses humour and Merryn’s eccentricity to bring the campaign to life in a way that will appeal to a wide cross-section of consumers.

It was directed by Rosie May Bird-Smith of Biscuit Films. Famous for her short films, such as the recent ‘Herd Immunity’, which won a Gold at the British Short Film Awards, she has won a huge number of awards for comedic directing, including ‘Best Young and Emerging Talent’ at the British Arrows and ‘Best Director’ at the Papaya Films Young Directors Gala. She was brought onto the production to bring that innate talent to bear on bringing the humour in the script and in Merryn to life.

A 30” version was released on the 15^th of September on social media, and it will hit TV screens on 6 October. There will also be an 80” second ‘feature’ launching on YouTube on the 6th of October. It will be supported by social, PR, OOH and shopper marketing.