Grubhub is emphasizing its customers’ feelings in a campaign that focuses on how you respond to your favorite food—and putting words to the emotions.
The campaign, “That Grubhub Feeling,” comes as food industry marketing battles continue to intensify with restaurants reopening.
The focus is on “owning the emotional space around food,” said Jody Friedericks, senior VP of brand creative at Known Global, the creative agency behind the campaign.
The campaign, launching today, has eight spots including one showing a woman becoming “ensushiastic” before she puts a maki roll in her mouth.
The word is part of the new “lexicon” Grubhub has created to describe how you feel when you get exactly what you’ve been craving, said Known’s Friedericks. Other words such as “chewphoria,” “fantasnack,” "pizahhh," "meatitation" and “eggzilaration” are also attempting to join the more commonly used “hangry.”
While the brand’s competitors–such as Uber Eats and DoorDash–focus on convenience or variety, Grubhub is seeking to “create something culture could grasp onto so consumers could make it their own," said Friedericks.
Grubhub wants to “connect diners with food,” according to Grubhub VP and Head of Brand and Creative Ben Whitla, instead of “building transactional relationships." This strategy of connecting with customers falls in line with the Grubhub Guarantee, a feature that guarantees future perks such as discounts if there are problems with delivery or the price of an order.
Although the campaign spans nationally, it focuses on New York. Grubhub has partnered with Howard Stern to air live reads and a pre-recorded spot on Stern’s radio show.
In addition to appealing to New York’s big food delivery culture, according to Grubhub’s Whitla, the brand’s focus on New York also aims to reach the majority of remaining Seamless users, who are primarily located in the tri-state area. Grubhub merged with Seamless in 2013, and is phasing out use of the Seamless name.
By launching this campaign now, a year after it was acquired by Amsterdam-based Just Eat Takeaway.com NV for for $7.3 billion, the brand also wants to familiarize customers with its new color (orange) and new logo (a house icon). Aside from one other campaign focusing on winter sports athletes, this is Grubhub’s primary campaign for this quarter.
The brand had a campaign in the summer that thanked restaurants, highlighting them as the cornerstone of their business–“without you, we wouldn’t be Grubhub. We’d just be hub,” said one spot.
One (small?) thing: Grubhub's new spots include the doorbell sound which Uber’s CEO lightheartedly apologized for last week after dog owners complained that it made their dogs overexcited. Friedericks said she gets the same feeling with her dog–but noted that the doorbell ties back to that “emotional moment” when you hear your food coming.
