• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, October 7, 2014

A new campaign from Cheerios in Canada expands on the brand's groundbreaking U.S. ads featuring a biracial family, including its 2014 Super Bowl spot.

The campaign — dubbed "The Cheerios Effect" after the natural phenomenon wherein Cheerios, or any small, floating, objects will gravitate toward one another — consists of an initial ad/video showing the effect in action ("We all love to connect. That's the Cheerios Effect.") and a series of TV ads and videos telling the stories of several real Canadian families. 

They include a gay couple and their adopted daughter Raphaëlle, talking about her importance in their lives; a physically disabled musician and his able-bodied wife, who came together after she saw a video of him performing his work; a married couple who came from two very different cultures; two cousins, one of whom is hearing-impaired, who talk about growing up like sisters and their close relationship; and a woman who saved and adopted a puppy on her vacation in Costa Rica. 

“We were inspired by the work we saw in the U.S.,” Jason Doolan, General Mills Canada’s director of marketing for cereal, told The Globe and Mail. "What we realized at that point was, by simply reflecting the diversity of real people, there’s an opportunity to engage in a social conversation that is important to a lot of people.”

"We found real people with amazing stories of connection and created our TV and digital campaign around sharing those stories," said Amanda Hsueh, marketing manager in the cereals division, on General Mills's blog, pointing out that the theme of family connections has long been the heart of Cheerios' brand identity. "We are hosting longer documentary-style videos on YouTube that tell more of the background and details about each of our individual stories."

Viewers are also being encouraged to go to a dedicated site, CheeriosEffect.ca, and share their own stories of connection. They can type in their stories, and then create personalized videos that include customized images of the Cheerios coming together in a bowl. The page automatically picks up keywords from the stories. 

The TV ads will run through April. Although they are being aired only in Canada, some of the videos are currently being featured on the brand's geographic boundaries-crossing English language Twitter and Facebook sites.

The campaign is the first in the brand's history to span multiple varieties of Cheerios (including original, Honey Nut and Multigrain), and it has the largest campaign budget for the brand in the Canadian market in at least 10 years, Doolan reported.