Taco Bell Urges You to Break Out of Oppressive Breakfast Dystopia
By Matthew Lyle • March 24, 2015Taco Bell is tapping into Cold War-era propaganda imagery along with Orwellian and “Hunger Games” themes to launch Taco Bell’s next big breakfast campaign.
In one of the most unusual breakfast campaigns ever, Taco Bell’s TV campaign breaking March 24 begins with a 60-second highly stylized spot that shows two young people breaking away from an oppressive, dystopian prison-camp-like setting in a world called the “Routine Republic.” There, people eat only small, round breakfast sandwiches. As a young man waits in line to receive his routine breakfast, he pulls a sheet of paper out of his pocket that has a hexagon shape on it — a reference to the chain’s A.M. Crunchwrap — and the word “defect.”
Chris Brandt, Taco Bell’s chief marketing officer, said the idea behind the campaign was to highlight how “there was a sea of sameness” in fast-food breakfast. “It’s the most routinized time of day, and it’s hard to get people out of being on autopilot. We’re pushing against that routine….we don’t want to look like everyone else.”
The campaign includes propaganda-inspired posters that will be scattered around New York and Los Angeles starting March 23. The chain put significant digital and social media muscle behind the effort, which, among other things, will encourage people to visit its two new websites: BreakfastDefectors.com and RoutineRepublic.com. The company will also offer giveaways and enlist its stable of social-media influencers to spread the word.