Oatly's - When Oatly Took Down The Moo-fia

CHALLENGE & OBJECTIVE

In early 2024, actor / creator @andrea_valls had social media in stitches with her viral video: Cow's milk when she hears you've quit Oat.

She personified cow’s milk as a scorned mob wife addressing someone who’s come crawling back after quitting oat.

Oat drinks came out looking like the homewrecking villain that we knew our client, Oatly, wasn’t going to take lying down.

As a brand entrenched in culture, this was a perfect opportunity to stir Oatly into a viral moment without ruining the vibes.

We had to clap back in a natural but memorable way for seamless brand exposure.

​

​STRATEGY

Brands want to broadcast, but social media rewards relevance. 

In recent years we’ve seen brands engage with viral posts and awkwardly attempt to insert themselves into the conversation. It’s very easy to try too hard and come across as cringeworthy. Especially when doing it via a creator on behalf of a brand on merciless social media. The trick is to play into the mood of the moment.

Serialized sketches - where one creator takes on the role of many characters - have been hugely successful. We knew that if we got the tone and timing right, we could slip Oatly in as the follow-up character and add to the fun instead of distracting from it.

And it wasn’t just us. The audience was asking too:

“@Thunderhobs: we need the oat milk pov 😭😭😭”

As a brand that knows what it takes to operate at the speed of culture, we aligned on the idea immediately. Now, we just needed Andrea on board.

​

​EXECUTION​

Social media churns faster than it takes for milk to curdle, so speed was of the essence.

Andrea went from agreeing to creating the character, filming the sequel and posting it all within 24 hours (48 hours after the original) which meant it caught the crest of the wave of attention from the original video.

Her vivacious oat drink mob wife defended oat with facts and an attitude Oatly was proud to stand by: When you bump into Oatly after going back to Cow.

The brand’s innovative, playful, and socially savvy brand ethos was on full display and completely embraced by the audience. 

It was a perfect brand-creator collab that had fans applauding the sponsored character and demanding a continuation of the series, one of the internet’s highest honours!

RESULTS

Within a week, across TikTok and Instagram, the video attracted:

Audience Appreciation

Audience reactions proved the validity and memorability of Oatly’s contribution:

• "Omg!!! So good 😂😂😂 perfect brand collab 🥰"

• “Bravo again and great work from the @oatly marketing bods for partnering with this talented actor so promptly 👏👏👏😍 I might have to go back myself ;)”