Foodservice Marketing Agency - Raising Awareness for Coeliac Awareness Week

Since 2006 I’ve been talking about the importance of catering for gluten intolerances on behalf of Almondy, Sweden’s great tasting gluten-free cakes, which recently celebrated its 10,000,000th cake sale here in the UK. In this time I’ve seen gluten-free grow from a niche market to exploding into the foodservice and retail sectors, thanks partly to celebrity endorsements, but also due to the hard work of amazing organisations such as Coeliac UK, which is educating people on the symptoms of what can be a serious and deadly disease.

Coeliac disease affects 1 in 100 people in the UK, and the UK gluten-free market is forecast to grow by 46% by 2017*. On top of this, 62% of people living with coeliac disease only eat out once a month or less due to lack of menu choices (survey by Coeliac UK). Therefore there is a huge demand for gluten-free dishes and as a leading foodservice agency, Jellybean has been supporting several of its clients in tapping into the opportunity, showcasing how their products can put gluten-free options onto menus.

From social media campaigns, to consumer insight, infographics and recipe development, during this year’s Coeliac Awareness Week, Jellybean developed bespoke campaigns with Aviko, Tilda and Almondy that not only raised awareness for Coeliac UK and the week itself, but importantly delivered real results for the brands.

As well as inspiring chefs to consider more gluten-free options on menus, our activity generated 1,000 new followers for our clients’ Twitter accounts and 6,600,000 opportunities to see in just one week! Here’s a snap shot of what we’ve been up to for Coeliac Awareness Week 2015.

Tilda Seven Days of Gluten Free Giveaways

Tilda was looking to promote the gluten-free properties of its rice through the Tilda Foodservice Twitter account @TildaChef, giving bona fide UK chefs the chance to win a 5Kg bag of Tilda Easy Cook Basmati each day of the week. In addition our crack team of social media experts increased their Twitter activity to include a greater focus on gluten-free Tilda recipes, drove engagement with anagrams, as well as targeting those using the #CoeliacUKAwarenessWeek. During the week @TildaChef received over 400 new followers and generated a staggering 3 million opportunities to see!

Aviko Gluten-Free Heroes

With over 70 gluten-free products in its range and two dedicated gluten-free factories, Aviko was keen to highlight its potato sides to operators and help caterers become ‘Gluten-Free Heroes’ by swapping popular menu sides to more Coeliac friendly options. Jellybean carried out consumer research that highlighted the risks of serving hidden gluten to Coeliacs – and through deep drilling found that 60% of people don’t realise that not all chips are gluten-free – this gave us our hook!

Armed with hard-hitting stats to show the risk of serving hidden gluten, a high-impact infographic was developed to make the stats easy to share, and awareness on an important issue driven through PR and social media generating pick-up across the trade press. Recipes were also developed with the Craft Guild of Chefs’ Daniel Ayton – a Coeliac himself – to inspire caterers to take action on gluten and adapt their menus.

During Coeliac Awareness Week Twitter activity was ramped-up to highlight Aviko’s gluten free range. This included high-impact info-bites taken from the research and menu inspiration was offered via Coeliac friendly recipe cards. We also focused on highlighting the important work of Coeliac UK, supporting the charity with Aviko pledging to donate £2 for every follow and RT during the week, as well as the chance to win a personalised chef’s jacket and one of five Aviko and Coeliac UK goody bags. The week long activity generated an opportunity to see of 1.2M and raised £600 for an important cause.

Almondy #GFChocoHamper

Last year Jellybean worked with Almondy to help it launch four new cakes into foodservice and retail, including an indulgent new Cadbury cake topped with real Dairy Milk buttons. To continue building awareness of the cake with Almondy’s followers and promote Almondy’s 33 years of gluten-free credentials we used Twitter and a simple, yet effective follow and RT mechanic to win one of five Gluten-Free Cadbury Hampers through its #GFChocoHamper campaign. The giveaway generated a huge amount of engagement taking Almondy’s following to over 3,000 followers and reaching well over a 2 million people.

But our work around gluten-free and coeliac friendly menus doesn’t stop at Coeliac Awareness Week. With the introduction of the allergen legislation back in December, free-from and allergens are very much at the top of mind for caterers and we will do all we can to ensure our clients’ brands help chefs and caterers maximise the opportunity from this growing market. To find out more about Coeliac Awareness Week and Coeliac UK click here.

* F&D Innovation Network’s free-from conference, 2013