Objectives

After decades of a slow but steady decline in milk consumption, published research identified a new usage occasion for chocolate milk: as an effective beverage for helping adults recover after strenuous exercise. Recognizing this as an opportunity to engage lapsed milk drinkers, drive incremental sales of flavored milk and provide a positive health halo around the category, we launched Mission Apolo: BUILT WITH CHOCOLATE MILK to show how elite athletes recover with chocolate milk as part of their recovery in a way that was believable, educational and motivating.

To add credibility of the program, we capitalized on our existing partnership with IRONMAN^®. IRONMAN is the pinnacle in endurance sports and is a globally recognized, reputable sports brand, making its audience an ideal target and its endorsement a powerful credibility-builder among a broader audience of athletes. In addition, we negotiated an in-kind partnership with Rodale's Women's Health magazine to reach millions of active-minded women.

Leveraging these partnerships, we were able to reach a large community of active adults about the benefits chocolate milk can provide, focusing on the following objectives:

• Increase awareness of chocolate milk's post-exercise recovery benefits among athletes – from IRONMAN triathletes to everyday fitness enthusiasts.
• Improve perceptions of chocolate milk as a post-exercise recovery beverage.
• Engage a wide range of athletes and influencers online and inspire them to include chocolate milk as part of their after-exercise routine.
• Drive athlete-to-athlete advocacy around chocolate milk's recovery benefits with efficient costs per engagement for paid social activity.
• Increase consumption of chocolate milk

Strategy and Execution

To go head to head with established sports beverages and breakthrough in a way that was credible, engaging and far-reaching, we partnered with Olympic speedskater Apolo Ohno and Women's Health Fitness Director Jen Ator and transformed them into IRONMAN triathletes. The pair served as chocolate milk ambassadors, sharing their progress via at-race interactions, social media, blog posts and media interviews.

Our winning program strategy consisted of:

Producing and promoting an online documentary series that followed Apolo and Jen on an epic journey to conquer the most coveted, yet challenging one-day endurance competition on the planet: the 140.6-mile IRONMAN World Championship triathlon in Kona-Kailua, Hawaii. The series brought to life the training journey by capturing key milestones and the day-to-day challenges they faced.

Leveraging key milestones of the journey with media to generate awareness of the chocolate milk recovery messages.

Tapping partnerships with IRONMAN and Women's Health to endorse and deliver our key messages to the media and their engaged online communities.

Partnering with pro IRONMAN athletes to validate the credibility of refueling with chocolate milk and spread the messaging to their online fan base.

To bring the chocolate milk science to life, we engaged athletes via traditional and digital channels by:

• Assembling a top-tier team to reach a broad audience via key influencers: Ohno and Ator were given professional advice on training and recovery, received the necessary tools to take on the sport of triathlon and were educated on nutritional know-how.
• oAssembling an elite team of spokespeople from various backgrounds to give a national hook as well as a local angle in different media markets, making the campaign more credible to our target demographic.

Publishing compelling content to share our story: Cameras followed Ohno and Ator during their six-month journey through the web series. The documentary-style webisodes followed the highs and lows of their training and authentically showcased how chocolate milk helped their bodies recover.

oWebisodes were promoted through paid syndication, search, promotion on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.

Generating organic conversations via key partnerships: Content was syndicated across partner channels including race partners, endurance sports brands, spokespeople, Women's Health, and elite athletes.

• Conducting ongoing media outreach: We conducted local market media relations to help generate media coverage in addition to the ongoing national media coverage spanning entertainment and sports outlets as a result of media appearances and desk side interviews with editors and influencer events.

EFFECTIVENESS AND Results

Increase Awareness

Of the more than 325MM branded impressions generated since April:

• National and local market coverage has appeared surrounding all major milestones of the program
• Adult exercisers aware of the campaign are 61% more likely to recall "the benefit of drinking chocolate milk after exercise" than those unaware (Radius research, Q2'14).

The partnership with Women's Health generated 8.5MM impressions

Also to be considered for total program results are two key milestones to conclude the program including a media day in New York to launch the NBC broadcast of the IRONMAN World Championship and distributing the final episode of the Mission Apolo series (November).

Improve Perception

Across all audiences research has shown awareness has significantly improved:

§Adult exercisers aware of the campaign are 54% more likely to agree with the benefit of chocolate milk helping them to recover after exercise (Radius research, Q2'14).

Drive Engagement and Advocacy

Webisode Views:

§YouTube Video Views: So far the Mission Apolo video series has generated 967,881 views, and is on track to deliver 2 million views by the end of the year.

Engagement with got chocolate milk? digital channels:

§Facebook (Period: April 1 – October 22)

oLikes: 187,310 (from 184,188): 2% growth

oMentions: 700; Potential Impressions: 9.1 MM

• oCost per engagement across paid Facebook: $0.30
• o73% lower (more efficient) than benchmark of $1.11

§Twitter (Period: April 1 – October 22)

oFollowers: 8,291 (from 6,471): 27% growth

oMentions: 10,162; Potential Impressions: 124.1 MM

oCost per engagement across paid Twitter: $1.95

o76% higher (less efficient) than benchmark of $1.11

o1.68% engagement rate across promoted Tweets

oBenchmark for engagement is 1-3%

Instagram (Period: April 1 – October 22)

oFollowers: 3,288 (from 1,146): 187% growth

oMentions: 618; Potential Impressions: 3.5 MM

Increase Consumption of Chocolate Milk

The campaign awareness has had a positive effect on moving chocolate milk consumption: 18% of adult exercisers who are aware of the campaign had consumed milk in the past day, compared to 6% of those who were unaware of the campaign (Radius research, Q2'14).

Media