To highlight the ‘flame grilled not fried’ taste benefits of their burgers, we worked with Burger King to ‘launch’ a new fragrance for men: Flame, the scent of flame grilled beef.  When we were tasked with identifying a face (and a torso) to front the campaign we thought why go for your run of the mill Daniel Craig, 50 Cent or Gerard Butler when you can have a real man’s man and international sex symbol without breaking the bank? Hello, Mr Piers Morgan!

The resulting Flame launch picture prompted an ‘Is it or isn’t it?’ debate about Piers’ torso (it isn’t, just in case you were wondering) in the media and blanket national coverage for Burger King in the likes of The Sun, The Daily Mail, The Guardian, celebrity and consumer lifestyle picture pages, as well as plenty of international news, including The David Letterman show. Cow arranged for the Flame fragrance was sold in Red5 gadget shops in the UK, including their concession in Selfridges where we managed a launch with Piers and plenty of paparazzi and TV and radio news interviews.

The Piers Morgan Flame campaign generated over 450 pieces of coverage, including 15 pieces of national, with 92% mentioning Flame and 42% mentioning flame grilled not fried. The advertising value of the campaign was a whopping £2m and showed a brand uplift of 3.7%. Just for good measure Flame was shortlisted in the CIPR Awards 2010 for Best Product Launch.