Hellmann’s marked National Sandwich Day (3 November) with a petition to add a layer of mayonnaise to what it called ‘the driest emoji on the keyboard’.
Jessica Grigoriou, SVP marketing of condiments at Unilever, told Little Black Book that millions of people use the sandwich emoji on a daily basis and that adding a mayo layer would show Hellmann’s ‘belongs in people’s daily chats’.
There’s also a strategic angle. Nielsen data from 2023 shows that Hellmann’s holds a commanding 51.5% share of the UK mayo market. By adding mayo to the sandwich emoji, the brand is seeking to expand the category and, subsequently, strengthen its own share since consumers are likely to gravitate toward the dominant brand (i.e., Hellmann’s) when choosing products.
This campaign is the brand’s latest expression of playful activism, as Grigoriou said it uses humour to ‘show up authentically in culture’. After the success of its #MakeTasteNotWaste initiative, which showed consumers how to use mayo to reduce food waste, Hellmann’s now has the freedom to lean into this type of lighter, less serious messaging.
At the time of writing, the petition has 258 signatures on change.org, though Hellmann’s hopes mayo fans will also share the petition online and with their friends.
This is not the first time a brand has campaigned to fix a ‘dry’ emoji.
In 2018, Philadelphia cream cheese teamed up with Droga5 New York and VMLY&R to run a Twitter poll asking whether Apple’s new bagel emoji needed cream cheese. Over 13,000 people responded, with 81.6% voting in favour.
The brand then launched an online petition and received over 1,200 signatures. Although this was significantly lower than Philadelphia’s goal of 30,000, it still persuaded Apple to add a cream cheese layer to the emoji.
The Laughing Cow — another cheese brand — similarly launched a petition to have Apple add a laughing cow emoji to keyboards this year. The petition garnered 7,800 signatures, although the brand did encourage people to sign by committing to donate 50 cents to Food Banks Canada for every signature it received.
Emojis can be powerful branding tools. A 2018 Leanplum study found consumers were 66% more likely to open marketing emails with emojis in the subject line and 254% more likely to open emoji-based push notifications.
In 2019, Ford even invested $50,000 to sponsor the design of a blue pickup truck emoji, according to The Atlantic. Matt VanDyke, then Ford’s director of marketing, told the publication that the lack of a pickup emoji had been ‘a personal point of anger’ for years.
That said, not every brand needs to fork out five figures to have an emoji they can use. This year, Knorr Philippines partnered with MullenLowe to creatively ‘claim’ an existing emoji — the yellow square.
The brand began by commenting yellow squares on food influencers’ posts, then started sharing emoji-only recipes, asking fans to guess the dish. The tactic effectively turned the yellow square into the ‘Knorr cube’ emoji.
Still, brands should exercise caution when creating, claiming, or using emojis.
New research from Fairfield University warns that emojis can backfire if used without cultural sensitivity. Different generations interpret them differently — for example, Gen Z uses the skull emoji to express laughter, while older users associate it with death.
The researchers, therefore, advise brands to stay attuned to cultural trends and ensure they understand consumers’ evolving emoji usage.
Featured image: Hellmann’s proposed emoji / change.org