• by Danielle Oster , December 4, 2023

Snyder’s of Hanover is asking consumers to rethink a classic holiday tradition and make pretzel instead of gingerbread houses.

The Campbell’s-owned brand gives a wittily humane reason for this request, in a campaign created in partnership with Saatchi & Saatchi. In a video, a spokesperson explains that every holiday gingerbread people “are forced to live in houses made of themselves.”

So the brand is calling on viewers to build a Snyder’s Pretzel Cabin instead, and spare the gingerbread people the unnerving realization of sharing the same core materials as the walls around them. To help consumers get started, the brand is sharing three pretzel house designs.

“The holiday season is a critical drive period for the pretzel category and a time where we see the largest spike in consumption.  We saw this as a new opportunity to encourage our consumers to upgrade their celebrations in an unexpected way with Snyder’s pretzels,” Nick Hammitt, vice president of salty snacks marketing, Campbell's Snacks, told Marketing Daily, explaining  that the campaign sought to shake up a popular seasonal activity “in a unique and salty way.”

 “As we thought about holiday traditions and relevant ways to connect with our consumers during this time, we realized that while gingerbread house making is a beloved festive activity, it could use a bit of a refresh,” he added. “We know that our Snyder’s pretzels not only taste amazing, but that we have an advantage in terms of the varieties and shapes we offer.  This gave us an opportunity to take the popular consumer behavior and to make it ownable with Snyder’s Pretzel Cabins.”

According to Hammitt, in a brand survey conducted with Harris Poll, 68% of respondents viewed a holiday house made out of pretzels instead of gingerbread as a fun way to mix up the tradition, and over half (54%) admitted they don’t eat the gingerbread house once they’re constructed it.

Hammitt explained that the brand worked with agency partner Saatchi & Saatchi to create a “holistic consumer experience” to encourage audiences to shake up their holiday traditions “in a humorous and quintessentially Snyder’s way while encouraging our audience to choose our pretzels.”

The campaign will run across  Meta, TikTok, Pinterest and YouTube through Dec. 24. To extend the experience and encourage the switch to pretzel cabins, the brand also developed three different  Snyder’s Pretzel Cabin recipes housed on the campaign microsite for dwellings with distinct designs: The Holiday Haus, The Tasteful A-Frame, and The Frosted Chalet.