Brief:
- Sabra Dipping Company, which is jointly owned by PepsiCo and Strauss, has teamed with vegan TikTok star Tabitha Brown on the brand's first shoppable video series to help busy parents make healthy snacks for their housebound kids. "Snack to School" will let viewers of Sabra's social channels add ingredients to an online shopping cart and check out from a preferred retailer, per an announcement.
- The content includes videos on Sabra's social channels including Facebook and Instagram, in addition to recipe breakdowns on Pinterest and bonus tips and commentary on Brown's @iamtabithabrown channel on TikTok. Brown shares a variety of plant-based recipes in the kid-friendly series such as Creamy Pasta with 'Sausage,' Chocolate Cinnamon Banana Toast and Flatbread Pizza.
- Sabra and Brown developed the video series as 74% of caregivers said they expect this back-to-school season to be more chaotic than in the past, while 64% of parents said they dread making lunch at home again during the school year, per a survey of 2,000 adults that One Poll conducted on behalf of Sabra.
Insight:
Sabra's campaign leans into the unique challenges families with children at home face this year as the pandemic's impact continues to be felt, and tries to lend a hand by helping parents easily provide healthy meal and snack choice while leveraging entertaining content on a platform favored by kids to make those choice potentially more palatable. The content stars Tabitha Brown, who joined TikTok in March and has quickly amassed a large following with a mix of quick vegan cooking tips and inspirational messages.
The campaign's positioning is based on research that found 70% of caregivers are "radically" changing how they prepare lunch and snacks for the school year, while 73% said they plan to limit how much extra sugar their kids eat. Half of families see the back-to-school season as a chance to get "back to health," with 41% of caregivers seeking to change course from feeding their kids comfort foods as they did when the coronavirus pandemic began, per Sabra's research.
By blanketing its social media channels with the video series, Sabra can reach younger parents and kids who are harder to reach through traditional media like linear TV, while also offering an ability to shop directly for Sabra's products online. As social networks add more shopping features, social commerce sales are forecast to almost quadruple to $84.2 billion in 2024, making up 7.8% of ecommerce sales, from $22 billion last year, per data compiled by Statista.
Sabra's collaboration with Brown is another sign of how brands are enlisting social influencers to help spread their messaging online and cut through ad clutter. Brown has 4.4 million followers on TikTok, 2.9 million on Instagram and 1.8 million on Facebook, reaching more online consumers than Sabra does with its respective social media accounts. Sabra's account on TikTok has about 29,000 followers, while about 34,000 follow the snack brand on Instagram, making a collaboration with an influencer like Brown necessary to extend the reach of its campaign. Younger U.S. consumers also tend to trust the influencers they follow, with 44% of Generation Z saying they have made a purchase based on a recommendation from an influencer, compared with 26% of the general population, researcher Kantar found in a consumer study.
As TikTok's popularity has grown, its biggest influencers are increasingly being courted by brands and are also showing up on other platforms, trends that do not so far seem to have been impacted by the ongoing uncertainty over whether the app will have new owners in the U.S. or be shut down. Charli D'Amelio, the teenager with the biggest following on TikTok, is now being featured in a social media campaign by coffee and bakery chain Dunkin' to promote a beverage named after her. Addison Rae, another TikTok influencer, in July started streaming a podcast on audio platform Spotify co-hosted with her mom to share personal advice with her followers.
