The Sweetest Advertising Waitrose Got This Easter (And I Totally Fell Hook, Line, and Sinker)

Last week I sat down to watch the spring edition of Supermarket Secrets with Greg Wallace (there are two days left to watch it on BBC iPlayer so make sure you see it whilst you still can!). If you aren't familiar with the format of the programme, it is pretty much exactly as it sounds. Greg spends time with all of the leading UK supermarkets to find out how they deal with the high demand for certain food and drink items throughout the seasons.

The episode last week touched on Pancake Day (think about how many eggs we need to make our pancakes), but the main story was focussed on Easter. This is hardly surprising given how much money we spend on chocolate at this time of the year! Now let's get something out in the open: I LOVE CHOCOLATE (something which Katy shamelessly mentioned in her latest blog post - yes fellow #OxMeet ladies, we ate all the cookies). Naturally a programme about delicious Easter chocolate would capture my attention.

So imagine my delight when the story on Supermarket Secrets turned out to be about Waitrose and their quest to come up with a concept that was a little bit different to their competitors. In short, they basically came up with a range called Woodland friends which are an assortment of animals shaped from chocolate. Funnily enough they are woodland creatures! Here they are:

The story on the programme was mainly focussed on our friend Ollie the owl as this was the first of the creatures to be tested. Waitrose needed to be sure that the design could actually be created in a way that would result in the right thickness of chocolate (it's Belgian) for quality purposes. Ollie started out a bit thinner, but luckily for you and me, he is now a chunky little beast. Wise move, Waitrose.

However they also introduced Spike the hedgehog which I absolutely loved as he has such a cheeky chocolatey face. And then there is Hop the frog, who looks a bit confused, albeit delicious. You may say I'm too old to be seduced by such forms of marketing - after all I do work in the industry and am 25 years old. Yet aren't we all suckers for "cute" things? Think about all those cat videos you've watched recently, or if you are like me, pictures of itty bitty puppies.

So I'm happy to admit that I fell hook, line and sinker for the brilliant advertising that Waitrose achieved by getting their story covered in the programme. It was especially clever because it was on BBC2, the perfect audience to appeal to a Waitrose shopper. Even though I usually shop in Tesco (it is closer to where I live, and generally I spend less money) I made a special stop off in Waitrose to get my hands on the Woodland creature range.

BUT ALAS! There was only Hog the frog! I bought this for my niece for Easter (yeah OK so she is a baby still but I'm sure her mum and dad will be more than happy to eat it on her behalf). However the issue remained that I did not have a Spike or an Ollie! #firstworldproblems you say? Yes, I know, but I'm sure you are buying chocolate for Easter too...

The fact that Waitrose had sold out of much of their range in my local branch on Saturday can only reinforce the message that they had the sweetest marketing campaign available to them. However they also had the smarts to get some stock back in store, which meant I came home to a couple of Woodland friends today (huge thanks to my fiancé for taking a special trip to satiate my chocolate cravings).

You'll have to wait to hear how the chocolate actually tastes as I'm going to try and wait until Easter to actually open them. Which might be difficult as they are sat on the shelf staring at me with their little woodland creature eyes...