Due to dietary restrictions during pregnancy, new moms often have to wait (at least) nine months for the foods they crave most.
Grubhub seized on this insight for a campaign offering new moms a “Special Delivery” for their first meal after childbirth, when they can finally have the meals they missed most.
The campaign launched with a stork-centered teaser video in late July, followed by celebratory post-delivery meal messaging driving traffic to a campaign site offering weekly promotional deals to new moms, including a $20 post-delivery meal credit.
“Special Delivery” centers around a user-generated content video of moms enjoying foods like burgers, cold cuts, and sushi after delivering. It’s running across channels including online video, paid social on Instagram, and organic promotion on social media platforms including Facebook, TikTok and X. The campaign is supported by a sizable influencer marketing component, including a partnership with TV personality and former “The Bachelor” contestant Ashley Iaconetti.
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Christopher Krautler, director of consumer PR for Grubhub, told Marketing Daily that genesis for the campaign stemmed from monitoring social channels for relevant popular conversation. “We had caught on to this trend of moms that had just given birth hosting that celebratory moment, [not just] celebrating their new baby, but them celebrating that first meal they got to eat after delivering,” he said. “We thought, ‘We have to do something with this.’”
That initial discovery was about two years ago, Krautler explained, but the brand wanted to dig into the phenomenon further and find the right approach, and strategic moment, to roll out the effort.
“This campaign is really about homing in on that moment of [childbirth], so we wanted to choose a moment attached to that,” Krautler said. As it happens, August is typically the month with the most new births in the U.S., he said, citing CDC data, so Grubhub timed the campaign to begin just before August and conclude with the end of the month.
Prior to launching the campaign, Grubhub conducted a survey to uncover insights related to moms’ post-delivery meals, finding that 75% of moms find the first post-delivery meal to be important enough to include it as part of their birth plan. Cold cuts were the top item listed for a desired post-delivery meal (31%), followed closely by sushi (29%).
Social media posts for the campaign have resulted in nearly 20% greater engagement than Grubhub’s typical engagement rate, and TikToks posts have outperformed the brand’s average engagement by more than 740%, according to the company. The brand also said a recent drop of its promotional meal credit was snatched up by users in under a minute.
Krautler said that while there weren’t currently any specific plans for follow-ups to the “Special Delivery” campaign, the approach lent itself both to building out the concept further and expanding the message into new markets, since the cultural insights apply well beyond the U.S.
“When families go home, there are so many needs that come when have a new child in the family – from needing diapers last minute, or baby formula, or whatever it might be,” he said, reflecting Grubhub’s expansions beyond food delivery, lending license to creative approaches falling under the “broader umbrella of ‘special delivery.’”
He added that the brand was “in active discussions” to roll out the “Special Delivery” campaign to other markets, but had not yet confirmed any decisions for such an expansion.