Morrisons continues Market Street focus in latest campaign

Morrisons has once again enlisted Ant and Dec to help promote its fresh food concept Market Street as it aims to prove the value of the range.

morrisons-antdec-2014-460
Ant and Dec are back to front Morrisons latest marketing campaign

The ads, created by DLKW Lowe, show the celebrity duo walking down a cobbled street and exploring the fresh food on offer. Fifteen Morrisons staff also star as “market traders”, showing off products including fresh fish, baked pies and flowers.

The spot ends with the strapline “Market freshness. Market prices. Only on Market Street at Morrisons.”

The 50-second ad will air on 3 February during Coronation Street on ITV. Morrisons recently announced that it had renewed its brand ambassador deal with Ant and Dec, as well as its sponsorship of their ITV shows Saturday Night Takeaway and Britain’s Got Talent.

Belinda Youngs, Morrisons’ corporate brand marketing director, says: “The advert demonstrates the pride we have in our Market Street prices, products and skilled, friendly colleagues. Ant and Dec have helped us bring the Morrisons fresh market to life as a destination for fresh value.”

Morrisons is hoping that its marketing strategy, which focuses on fresh food and own brand products, can help to turn around recent sales declines. However, so far there is little indication that this is working, with sales over Christmas dropping sharply and the supermarket forced to issue a profit warning.

It performed the worst of the three major supermarkets that have revealed Christmas trading figures as sales fell 5.6 per cent, compared to a 2.4 per cent decline at Tesco and a 0.2 per cent rise at Sainsbury’s. Asda will reveal how it performed over the festive season on 20 February.

Morrisons blamed its lack of online offering and heavy discounting by rivals for its poor performance. It has since launched its online grocery delivery service in Warwickshire and West Yorkshire, with plans for a further rollout this year.

It has also announced plans to introduce its own loyalty scheme to take on Tesco Clubcard and Sainsbury’s Nectar programmes.

Recommended

Mindi Chahal

Context is king in social media research

Mindi Chahal

It’s hard to miss all the advertising activity around the Super Bowl: the lead up, the event and the analysis and while it’s interesting to see which brands ‘won’, it’s just as interesting to consider why.

Ruth Mortimer

How you judge the hype cycle can make or break your brands

Ruth Mortimer

When should marketers take advantage of the hype about a new technology? Move too early and you’re the proud owner of a warehouse full of internet-enabled shoes while consumers are worried about leather soles. Move too slow and you may end up selling  standard shoes when the rest of the world is using their footwear as a wireless hotspot.