Dive Brief:
- LG Electronics USA this week is pairing its cooking appliances with BuzzFeed's Tasty social food network to create a new series of subscription boxes for baking cookies, according to a press release.
- The LG/Tasty Cookie Club subscription boxes offer seasonal cookie baking kits with step-by-step recipe directions, pre-measured organic ingredients and multi-purpose baking tools like a cookie scoop, baking mat and apron. The kits will be delivered quarterly and feature seasonal recipes, such as the Pumpkin Spice and Everything Nice Cookie Sandwich Kit for the fall.
- The partnership also includes a series of custom branded videos with new recipes by Tasty's Executive Chief in Residence Marcus Samuelsson and others. Tasty cookies will be available at Tasty's marquee location in New York City's Madison Square Garden and at other unspecified experiential activations. LG customers purchasing a qualifying appliance in November and December will receive a complimentary year-long subscription while Tasty fans can sign up at the web site for a subscription or buy a standalone kit for $40.
Dive Insight:
The subscription boxes from LG and Tasty represent an evolution in how both brands leverage marketing, taking advantage of the popularity of subscription boxes with consumers and pairing this with co-marketing to extend the potential reach. The brands say the recipes bake best in LG ranges and ovens, which have been designated the "Official Oven of the Tasty Kitchen" and feature LG's ProBake Convection Tech.
The free subscription box offer gives new LG oven/range owners a value-added reason to share their information with LG and maintain an after-market relationship with the brand, something appliance brands often try to accomplish by asking customers to register their products. In a way, it's the equivalent of a car dealership offering free tune-ups or discounts on new tires, helping to maintain that all-important relationship.
LG is also exploring the idea of offering experiences as another way of creating a relationship with customers that goes beyond just having products lined up in an appliance store, something that could help it attract younger customers who have shown a penchant for branded real-world experiences. In another experiential activation, LG last month hosted a pop-up bar in New York to showcase the entertainment possibilities of its latest refrigerator by providing cocktails that demonstrated the different kinds of "craft" ice its ice-maker could produce.
For its part, Tasty has been busily teaming up with partners that help consumers enjoy the tasty foods it presents. Last year, Tasty undertook a partnership with Walmart that offered a new line of kitchen products tied to the social network's recipe videos. This past August, Tasty again partnered with Walmart to let customers buy the ingredients seen in Tasty's cooking videos. One click in Tasty's mobile app added a recipe's ingredients to a Walmart's online shopping cart, for home delivery or curbside pickup at a Walmart store. And in May of last year, Tasty partnered with Burger King to offer how-to videos teaching users how to make their own Whopper Donut — a burger with a hole cut in the middle, in celebration of National Donut Day.
