Cateys 2024: Best Marketing Campaign Award: Kerb at Seven Dials Market

A marketing campaign that can turn a £10,000 investment into £2m worth of additional sales is “pure marketing witchcraft”, said one judge about this year’s winner of the Best Marketing Campaign Award. And in cash-strapped times the achievement of such significant return on investment from a very small budget should be widely celebrated. 

 

Kerb’s winning marketing campaign was focused on shining a light on the independently-owned market traders within its Seven Dials Market in London. 

 

Over the course of a year, through a combination of social media, creative on-site point of sale, out-of-home collateral, as well as PR and influencer engagement, Kerb was able to both attract guests to experience the small food businesses at Seven Dials Market as well as share the social enterprise story behind its Kerb+ ecosystem, which engages new food businesses to join and benefit from its newly established support.

 

Social media gave Kerb the platform to share a series of 18 video interviews with traders showcasing their cooking, which resulted in a combined watch time on Instagram of 900 hours. The campaign received some of the highest digital engagement Seven Dials Market had ever seen, achieving a reach of over 270,000 on Instagram alone.

 

While these videos were also featured in the Seven Dials Market email newsletter, with a bespoke email dedicated to one of the traders achieving an open rate of 39.7% across a database of 166,000, triggering a 5% visit conversion.

 

The multifaceted campaign also involved installing bespoke murals on the walls of the market, catching the eye of diners, while table signage prompted guests to scan a QR code to take them to the webpage for its inKERBator programme for small independent food businesses, which resulted in 1,300 scans, leading to new user traffic tripling year-on-year. In addition, a reach of over 45 million readers was recorded through press and influencer coverage. While awareness of Kerb increased – showcasing it as a street food brand with a “hefty slice of social impact” – so did applications to inKERBator, increasing 22% year on year. 

 

A modest budget of £10,000 was set so not to eat into the profit of Kerb’s social enterprise arm Kerb+. The budget was split across videography, signage and PR and events and resulted in an uplift in food revenue at Seven Dials Market of over £2m year-on-year. 

 

Through the success of the campaign Kerb is looking to replicate it again this year in Seven Dials Market but also as part of its global expansion into new markets.

 

An incredibly successful campaign with  an incredible revenue uplift makes Kerb a worthy winner of this year’s Best Marketing Campaign. 

 

What the judges said

 

“A well-deserved winner proving you can achieve a lot with very little budget and see jaw-dropping commercial success. A really beautiful campaign that the team should be proud of.” Ruth Carpenter

 

“To turn £10,000 into £2m is pure marketing witchcraft. I know how hard it is to work on these budgets and I have never managed that, so there could be only one winner.” Mark McCulloch

 

The shortlist

 

Fooditude

 

Heckfield Place, Hampshire

 

Kerb at Seven Dials Market

 

Luxury Family Hotels

 

Rosewood London

 

The judges

 

Ruth Carpenter Pizza Pilgrims

 

Sarah Collins Rick Stein Group

 

Jeremy Gibson Hospitality Action

 

Mark McCulloch Supersonic Inc