2012 Winners & Shortlists

Results and Effectiveness

Working with Chef Ohood in place of a regular TV presenter/chef we were able to encourage Saudi women to participate with our campaign. Over 1,000 recipes were received and 230 select women were invited to compete directly on air. During the campaign we saw a 3% increase in value share for Kraft Cheddar in KSA, a significant result for a category that has experienced gradual decline over the past few years. A result immeasurable in numbers however is the joy in creating a permissible outlet for everyday Saudi women to feel connected and to share their passion for cooking.

Creative Execution

In a society where the public representation of women in media is restricted, Kraft Cheddar created the unthinkable: a cooking program featuring a veiled Saudi woman, Chef Ohood. A first in the region! Maybe even the world. Chef Ohood was a real life Saudi housewife and not a classically trained chef; consequently she was able to connect with thousands of Saudi women on a very human level. For four weeks Chef Ohood shared her recipes with Saudi women who were delighted to see a member of their society representing a true slice of their lives. Chef Ohood encouraged viewers to participate by submitting their own recipes online and even invited her audience to join her on-air to showcase their talents. By building a platform where Saudi women felt represented, we were able to encourage them to interact and share their own ideas on the passion of cooking.

Insights, Strategy and the Idea

Kraft Cheddar was operating in a declining category and it was proving difficult to connect with Saudi women. The world was changing, albeit it, slowly in Saudi, but changing none the less. Financial reports show that 43,000 businesses are owned by entrepreneurial Saudi women. The figure includes home businesses such as baked-goods & fashion accessories sold through facebook! These women, the women making a statement of their own were the women that Kraft wanted to engage with. The question was how to do this when media guidelines still limited female presence on local Saudi TV? Two years ago we met Ohood Suhail – a veiled Saudi woman - during a Kraft recipe contest. Ohood showed great kitchen talents and Kraft sponsored her first cook book in 2010. In 2011, we set out to continue fostering her entrepreneurial kitchen passions by creating a new cooking show, one that engaged Ohoods peers.