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A ‘Big Food’ Narrative

Our Food Journey: Changing the Meaning of ‘Big Food’

Client
Hormel Foods
Capabilities
Strategic Narrative, Business Strategy
Our Food Journey – Hormel Foods

Goals

Attention Span was the critical partner in the creation of the “Our Food Journey” platform for Hormel Foods, from concept to content creation and distribution. This is an ongoing, extensive, multi-year campaign whose objective is to change the way the public and the company’s customers and partners perceive Hormel Foods.

At its core, Our Food Journey is about creating trust by humanizing and personalizing Hormel Foods’ mission, practices and people.

Our charge was to shift Hormel Foods from a defensive, reactive stance to a proactive, thought-leader approach using high-quality storytelling to show the organization’s commitment to creating a better world for all stakeholders. It was critical for the company to take control of its own historically modest narrative.

A challenge facing Hormel Foods

Many consumers and advocacy organizations have become skeptical that businesses, especially large ones in the food industry, can have a positive impact on the world.

Execution

To regain trust, we led the launch, starting with a bold positioning statement about the company’s position in the world: relationships with our people, our community, and the role Hormel Foods’ people and products play across the globe. To do so, we employ strategic narratives that take the form of: stories, films, workshops, podcasts, summits, and social media to become more transparent about the challenges and accomplishments of the company.

The narratives have been created specifically:

  1. To show that Hormel Foods’ concern for humanity is fundamental to the company’s mission and that Hormel’s core business itself is socially responsible.
  2. To demonstrate Hormel’s commitment to communities, at home in Minnesota and around the world.
  3. To establish Hormel Foods as the industry leader guided by heartland principles of honor, hard work, and concern for all.
  4. To demonstrate that Hormel is an innovator and leader in areas including reducing food insecurity and food waste, sustainable practices, food safety, nutrition, and worker safety.

We are conducting regular “story hunting” seminars for company executives and brand managers to teach them how to recognize potential story subjects. Once the company shifted from a defensive posture and made the commitment to tell open, honest and authentic stories, we discovered a wellspring of ideas.

Selected Examples — ‘Our Food Journey’ Narratives

  • Cooperation Beyond Words

    Jennie-O Turkey Store discovered a remarkable opportunity when they brought members of the deaf community into their workforce.

    Watch the Film

    Read: Cooperation Beyond Words

  • A Day on the Mogler Farm

    Multi-generation farms are becoming fewer and far between, but it’s good business to support them.

    Read: A Day on the Mogler Farm

  • Raising a Healthy Turkey

    Michelle Kromm works with a staff of veterinarians, nutritionists and flock supervisors who visit Jennie-O farms on a weekly basis to make sure those birds stay healthy

    Read: Raising a Healthy Turkey

  • Jack’s Famous Meatballs

    Why this young boy’s recipe became a family tradition.

    Read: Jack's Famous Meatballs

Results

Metrics

The stories written under the ‘Our Food Journey’ umbrella are most of the top-trafficked stories on the HormelFoods.com website, with the highest average time-on-page per visitor. Our Food Journey is a platform that has been embraced by all areas of the company. In addition to the project films being selected to anchor various shareholder meetings, corporate events, and conferences, ‘Our Food Journey’ has also been embraced as a keynote topic by the company’s CEO, Jim Snee.

Media Relations

The company has seen a steady rise in positive press coverage since the Our Food Journey content and messaging began rolling out.