Instacart’s first integrated brand campaign, “How Homemade is Made,” will focus on the love around a shared meal at home. The campaign also includes shoppable QR codes in both digital and out-of-home spots.

"Just in time for the biggest food and family holiday of the year, we’re proud to unveil ‘How Homemade is Made,’ our first fully integrated brand campaign that captures the love and joy that comes from enjoying a beloved family recipe,” Instacart CEO Fidji Simo said in a statement announcing the campaign.

The campaign is also the first to be led by Instacart’s new VP of brand and marketing, Laura Jones, who came to Instacart in June after six years at Uber.

“Coming off all of our growth from the pandemic, we have really become a critical product for so many families,” Jones said. She added that the campaign is aimed at the “busy achiever,” someone who is juggling their family, job, and hobbies, but still wants meaningful meals at home.

Instacart was one brand that benefited from the pandemic, as more customers began opting for grocery delivery and cooking at home. The company’s sales boomed from $7 billion in 2019 to $24.4 billion in 2020, according to an August report by eMarketer. The report forecasts that sales are expected to grow to $26 billion this year. The company also made several new hires this year, bringing on Facebook veterans Simo and Carolyn Everson.

Instacart is looking to keep customers coming back, while also expanding into other categories. As of July, the company says it offers products from over 600 national, regional and local retailers, including CVS, Walgreens, Target, Petco and Best Buy, as well as grocery chains Wegmans and Aldi. 

“We know our strength is in grocery,” said Jones. “But we like to say we are food first, but not food only.” 

Instacart President Carolyn Everson will speak at Ad Age Next: CMO. Register for the Dec. 1-2 event here.

The campaign will include out-of-home ads placed in San Francisco, California and Phoenix, Arizona. These ads, as well as the commercials, will feature QR codes that will link to seasonal recipes, including apple pie, tamales, short ribs and a boozy brunch. Customers will be able to shop the recipes and click to add all the ingredients to their cart in the Instacart app.

TwentyFirstCenturyBrand helped develop the campaign strategy. The firm's co-founder is former Coke and Airbnb marketer Jonathan Mildenhall. The ads, including the TV spots, were created by Goodby Silverstein & Partners (GS&P). The TV ads feature a man whose mom’s braised short ribs become so popular that she ends up building a franchise out of them, making them less appealing because they aren’t homemade.

“Instacart combines the speed and convenience of technology with one of the most emotionally resonant human experiences - the shared meal with loved ones,” Rich Silverstein, co-founder and co-chairman of GS&P, said in a statement. “We developed the ‘How Homemade is Made’ campaign to highlight how the traditional concepts of food, family and shared meals that we know consumers crave can not only live alongside modern technology, but actually be fueled by it.”

The TV commercials will run in 60 and 30-second spots from Nov. 14, 2021 to Jan. 2, 2022. The spots will run on ABC, CBS, and NBC, as well as YouTube. The campaign will also run in on paid social, and programmatic ads. 

Instacart is also beginning to collaborate with influencers with help from agency Media.Monks. The campaign will run on the usual social platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, but Jones says the brand is particularly excited to see how it does on TikTok where it’s tapped influencers like @greyandmama, @thecrunchbros, and @athomewithshannon. The campaign hashtag will be #HowHomemadeisMade.

“We are very much at the beginning of our journey in leveraging influencers, but we know they are powerful,” said Jones. “TikTkok will be an investment for us as we look to partner with more creators.”