CHICAGO: The bird flu’s multi-month chokehold on the egg industry is now fading into memory.
Trader Joe’s has taken down in-store signs asking grocery shoppers to kindly limit egg purchases to one carton per person; Google searches for “egg substitutes” have decreased 86% since February; and the American Egg Board is ready to make egg marketing fun again.
The board, which is dedicated to supporting American egg farmers by increasing demand for egg products, has created a new social media and influencer manager position. Once filled, the position will manage American Egg Board’s Incredible Egg social channels. The Incredible Egg is the board’s consumer-facing brand for all U.S. eggs and egg products.
The position will also lead the board’s Eggbassadors influencer network and collaborate with AOR Ketchum on marketing campaigns.
“After a pretty tough first quarter with bird flu, we’re ready to make our triumphant return of Meant to Be Broken,” Edward Hoffman, American Egg Board’s head of global marketing and communications, told PRWeek.
Meant to Be Broken, American Egg Board’s “biggest and boldest” campaign yet, kicked off in August and has gained 9 million engagements on social media since.
With a yearly budget of $2 million, Meant to Be Broken encourages consumers to “break out” of boring egg habits. The board leveraged influencer partnerships to post creative egg recipes – Olympic breakdancer Sunny Choi posted her “Sunny style” frozen custard recipe, for example.
However, Meant to Be Broken was “put on hold” as American Egg Board’s marketing shifted to “educating and protecting” consumers amid the bird flu outbreak, Hoffman explained, noting the board aims to resume its regular marketing programming by the end of July.
The board’s social media and influencer head will resume Meant to Be Broken, along with continuing American Egg Board’s Tower of Eggs Roblox recipe scavenger hunt and designing culturally relevant campaigns like the board’s Mean Girls-inspired Egg Burn Book.
The Eggbassador program, American Egg Board’s earned influencer program, launched last year, and the board’s Incredible Egg social media marketing spans across TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Facebook.
“We want to be sensitive to what consumers are feeling and we don’t want to be tone deaf,” Hoffman said of the board’s upcoming marketing pivot. “The kind of person coming in needs to recognize there’s some sort of creativity needed to shake people out of their perceptions, and disrupt the way people think about eggs.”