Burger King's 'Whopper Detour' campaign wins the 2020 Grand Effie

This year, Burger King has dominated the major awards fetes with the help of a moldy Whopper. But one of its older, much-celebrated campaigns, “Whopper Detour,” returned to the stage for another big win: The Grand Effie. At the 2020 Effie U.S. Summit and awards gala tonight, the judges awarded the 2018 campaign the top prize. Created out of FCB/New York and FCB/RED, it leveraged the brand’s mobile app to redirect McDonald’s customers to their nearest Burger King restaurant, with the promise of one-cent Whoppers. The campaign, which was the big winner at Cannes Lions last year, helped Burger King’s mobile app hit #1 in the iOS and Android app stores, generated $15m in incremental value and a 37:1 ROI, according to Effie Worldwide. Other companies involved in the campaign included Alison Brod Marketing & Communications, MullenLowe U.S. production company O Positive, and editorial shop Mackcut. Along with the top campaign prize, Burger King also earned this year’s honors for Most Effective Marketer and Most Effective Brand. Grand Jury co-chair Raja Rajamannar, chief marketing and communications officer at Mastercard, said in a statement that the "Whopper Detour" campaign “literally checked off every single box that we were looking for, which forms the criteria for evaluating the best campaign. The idea was great. The execution was great. And the results were terrific.” The night’s other big winners included IPG, which earned the nod for Most Effective Holding Company; McCann Worldgroup, which won Most Effective Agency Network; Wieden+Kennedy, winner of the Most Effective Independent Agency award; and McCann New York, named Most Effective Agency Office. See the full list of this year’s Effie winners here.

Burger King's 'Whopper Detour' campaign wins the 2020 Grand Effie

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