Chiquita unpeels AR Snapcodes for World Banana Day

Brief:

Chiquita is celebrating World Banana Day by putting scannable codes on 200 million of its iconic blue banana stickers. The company partnered with Snapchat to create Snapcodes that mobile users can scan with the image-messaging app to unlock augmented reality (AR) experiences, according to an announcement shared with Mobile Marketer.
Chiquita is sponsoring several of Snapchat's AR formats as part of the campaign. A world lens turns users into a dancing banana character; a face lens transforms their selfies into a Chiquita banana and a gamified lens challenges players to catch falling bananas in a virtual fruit bowl to score points.
While World Banana Day is on April 17, the campaign will run through the end of May. Chiquita worked with creative agency Dffrnt Media to develop the effort, which kicks off next month in the U.S. and rolls out worldwide in the following weeks.

Insight:

Chiquita's campaign for World Banana Day aims to engage health-conscious shoppers with its brand by offering fun AR experiences they can share on Snapchat, one of the most popular social media apps among young adults and teens.

Because millennial consumers tend to prefer brands that demonstrate social and environmental awareness, Chiquita has run a "Behind the Blue Sticker" initiative that aims to encourage innovation in farm management and logistics that reduce waste, carbon dioxide emissions and water usage, among other goals. For World Water Day on March 22, Chiquita announced a plan for water recycling aimed at cutting usage by 1.7 billion liters a year.

Bananas are the most popular fruit in U.S. grocery stores, with 73% of shoppers saying they had bought the fruit in the prior 12 months, ahead of apples (69%), grapes (62%), strawberries (62%) and oranges (56%), according to data compiled by the Packer. That popularity means that Chiquita can transform its key product into a creative advertising platform that could reach millions of people on social media as they use and share Snapchat's AR filters. More than 70% of the app's active users — around 130 million people — play with or view its AR lenses daily, suggesting that Chiquita's AR lenses could reach a large mobile audience.

Last summer, Chiquita partnered with Shazam on an AR experience, and its decision to now team with Snapchat for a similar campaign demonstrates the social platform's growth as a key advertising channel. Snapchat's ad revenue is set to rise about 24% to $832.1 million this year, eMarketer recently predicted.

Chiquita is among the brands that have added Snapcodes to their marketing arsenal to activate mobile experiences for on-the-go consumers. Movie studio Warner Bros. this week teamed up with Snapchat to create what it says is the first voice-activated AR lens to promote the superhero movie "Shazam!" that opens on April 5. Universal Pictures last month partnered with Snapchat on the first sponsored facial-recognition lenses for cats and dogs around "The Secret Life of Pets 2," the animated feature that premieres on June 7.