A pizza chain was deluged with 10 tons of pineapples after offering a free pizza in return for one. Here, Fatto a Mano’s marketing manager explains how the brand built a quirky social-media marketing campaign – and responded when it went viral.
It is a truism of marketing that it’s a good thing for a campaign to go viral. But, especially for independent brands with limited resources, it can be important to plan for every outcome. Including customers bringing 10 tons of pineapples to your chain of pizzerias.
That’s the lesson learned by Izzy England, marketing manager at Fatto a Mano, a restaurant group with four sites in London and three in Brighton.
Earlier this year, Fatto a Mano masterminded a social media marketing campaign that ultimately became almost too successful. After offering members of the public a free pizza in return for a pineapple, England estimates that customers turned up to the pizzeria’s seven branches with a total of 10 tons of the tropical fruit. England and her colleagues then, of course, had to work out what to do with the spiny bromeliads.
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‘Beautiful disgrace’
The campaign capitalized on the Marmite-like nature of pineapple on pizza, which some people love and others hate. At the center of the campaign was a specially designed pizza, the Bella Disgrazia (Italian for ‘beautiful disgrace’): a white pizza topped with pancetta, spicy salami, mozzarella, nduja hot honey, parmesan and, of course, chilli-roasted pineapple.
Fatto a Mano offered the pizza free to anyone who brought a pineapple into one of its branches, with the idea being these fruits would then be used to top further pizzas. However, after the campaign took on a life of its own on social media, the restaurant chain ended up with more pineapples than anybody knew what to do with.
“Our kitchen was working around the clock,” explains England, who adds that she knows the estimated tonnage of the fruit received as FareShare and the Felix Project, the two food banks that took the excess, recorded the weight. Every single pineapple, therefore, was used on pizzas or given to charity.
“It ended up being an unexpected and lovely consequence that we could work with these two charities to distribute the pineapples to food banks and community projects,” says England.
Fatto a Mano
Pineapple with that?
So, what’s the recipe for success for independent brands when launching a social media marketing campaign? Along with an engaging idea that capitalized on a topical point of debate, England explains that success in the campaign’s execution was down to a mixture of a well-chosen influencer partnership, strong complementary content and a garnish of good fortune.
“We launched it with a great Italian food influencer called Angelo Coassin,” England explains.
It seems the gods of the algorithm have an interest in the inclusion of fruit in savory food. “We really got picked up on the algorithm for our organic stuff. So we had a huge number of new followers and a huge amount of interest online through going viral. It was our most successful campaign, both organically and paid.”
In terms of where the campaign took hold, England says it was “pretty much equal on Instagram and TikTok.”
“We’d been drip-feeding bits on to our TikTok account before that. Then suddenly we gained a lot of traction from the campaign and it has been continuing to grow ever since”.
England says that Facebook also played a massive role, where the campaign did well for the brand through being shared in local residents’ groups.
Do you deliver?
England’s key takeaway (geddit?) for marketing for independent businesses is to build on the fun and dynamism that working for a smaller brand allows. “We’ve got a fun team and we’re very lucky to be independently owned,” she says. “So, we can do things very reactively.”
England adds that the campaign overall was a great success for Fatto a Mano. “We were giving loads of pizzas out, but we had queues out of the doors, there was so much energy around it and we had a lot of fun”.
Asked whether the stunt may become a regular feature, England remains tight-lipped. Pizza fans, keep your eyes (and your pineapples…?) peeled.
Dining and Cooking