BBH Breaks Down Tesco’s New Emotionally-Charged Platform
Tesco has been on a roll with their bold messaging, and their newest campaign doesn’t stray from this trend. While continuing to use their love of food as a focal point to their marketing, the supermarket has bid farewell to its long-running ‘Food Love Stories’ platform in favour of a fresh, emotionally charged replacement: ‘It’s Not a Little Thing. It’s Everything.’
Created with long standing partner BBH London, the campaign doesn’t just showcase good food – it elevates the small, meaningful moments that make food more than just sustenance.
The film, directed by Nogari through Iconoclast, takes a cinematic approach to everyday food moments, using Tesco’s instantly recognizable Bags for Life as the main storytelling device. From heartfelt apologies over a meal, to joyous celebrations around a table, the spot highlights the pivotal role food plays in culture, ritual and expression of emotion. It truly is a language of its own.
The campaign’s out-of-home executions, shot by photographer Jess Bonham, take this philosophy even further, by celebrating the textures, patterns, and intricate details that make every bite an experience.
For BBH associate creative directors Luke Till and Lawrence Bushell, the shift away from ‘Food Love Stories’ was about finding a distinct voice for Tesco in an increasingly crowded supermarket space. “Food is an incredibly emotive subject,” they explain. “It’s how we celebrate, how we heal, how we say the things we want to when words fail us. But the aim was always to be authentic and honest in the storytelling.”
The attention to sensory details is what makes this campaign stand out. “It might seem daft to say the crunch of a lettuce is everything, but give someone a soggy lettuce, and they’ll soon realize the importance,” Luke and Lawrence joke.
By embedding this messaging into everyday life – including limited-edition Bags for Life that carry key phrases from the ad – Tesco is making sure this isn’t just another campaign. It’s a cultural moment.
LBB’s Zoe Antonov sat down with the BBH team to find out more.
LBB> The ‘Food Love Stories’ campaign was a staple for Tesco for seven years. What inspired the shift to ‘It’s Not A Little Thing. It’s Everything.’ and how does it evolve Tesco’s brand storytelling?
Luke & Lawrence> ‘Food Love Stories’ was an incredibly successful campaign and became a valuable brand asset, but we think that in an ever-crowded retail market with lots of supermarkets selling a lot of the same things, we needed a shift to stand out again. So, for us, it was important to keep the emotional role of food but evolve it into something that was more instantly recognisable as Tesco.
LBB> Food is an incredibly emotive subject indeed. How did you ensure this campaign would resonate with audiences on a deeply personal level?
Luke & Lawrence> Food plays different roles for different people at different times: it’s how we celebrate, it’s how we heal, it’s how we say the things we want to when words fail us. But the aim was always to be authentic and honest in the storytelling, and hopefully, this resonates with the people who’ve watched it.
LBB> The film leans into the iconicity of Tesco’s Bags for Life as a storytelling device. How did that idea come about, and what role do the limited-edition bags play in extending the campaign beyond traditional media?
Luke & Lawrence> The bags are so iconic, and every time you see one out and about, you wonder what the story is. So connecting them to the emotional role the food plays made so much sense. But having them in-store was the cherry on top for us, it’s like seeing your ad play out in real life.
LBB> There’s a strong focus on the sensory details of food. Why was it important to highlight these moments, and how did you approach capturing them visually?
Luke & Lawrence> Food is the hero of the campaign because it sits at the heart of everything Tesco does as a business. Whether it be the emotional role of it or all the little things that make it great. All those little things that are everything. It might seem daft to say the crunch of a lettuce is everything, but give someone a soggy lettuce, and they soon realise the importance.
LBB> Jess Bonham’s photography plays a key role in the OOH executions. What made her the right choice for this campaign, and how did her approach to texture and composition help bring the idea to life?
Luke & Lawrence> Jess did a banging job. I think what we loved about her approach was that she forces you to look at food in a different way, which is exactly what we’re trying to do with this campaign. With the risk of sounding pretentious, she managed to make everything feel natural and delicate but yet still punch you in the face with an amazing image.
LBB> And Nogari’s direction brings a cinematic quality to the film. What was the creative vision for the spot, and how did you collaborate to achieve it?
Luke & Lawrence> I cannot say enough good things about Nogari and the team Iconoclast put together. The vision was always to tell an authentic story of the role food plays in people’s lives. But that could have easily gone wrong. I think what Nogari brought was a real, gentle subtlety to everything—from his casting, to his performances, to the lighting, the art department, and the way we treated the food. Like shooting each cast member cooking for 45 minutes freestyle so it never felt contrived. Every little thing was so considered and nuanced. It’s almost like he bought into our campaign line.
LBB> There’s a delicate balance between nostalgia and modernity in the way food is portrayed in advertising. How did you strike that balance to make the campaign feel fresh and relevant while still emotionally familiar?
Luke & Lawrence> Ah look, I think there’s always a danger with food that you get too excited about how creative you can be and how beautiful you can make something, but then it suddenly stops looking like food and becomes art. What Jess, Nogari, Sal, Katie, and our Design Director, Miguel, did was make sure we made the food feel exciting and fresh but not up its own arse. And I think that was about making the visuals feel different while ensuring the food always felt natural and true to life.
LBB> What impact do you hope this campaign has on the way people perceive Tesco, and how do you see it shaping the brand’s communications going forward?
Luke & Lawrence> We hope it shows just how much Tesco cares and obsesses about the food they put on their shelves and the role it plays in their customers’ lives. Their passion for food is nuts when you work with them. I mean, I’m more of a snack-between-pints-of-Guinness type of person, but they’ve even got me thinking about food differently. So hopefully, it inspires everyone.
