The archive · Advertising · Marketing decision · 2007–2008
Cadbury's drumming gorilla sells joy, not chocolate — sales up 9%, £4.88 per £1
A 90-second gorilla drumming to Phil Collins, with no product until the end, restarts Cadbury Dairy Milk — ROI of £4.88 per £1 spent.
Cadbury (Cadbury Schweppes)
What it had to solve
By 2007 Cadbury Dairy Milk had flatlining sales, a tired advertising model and fading relevance with younger drinkers, after salmonella recalls and cost-cutting headlines had battered the company.
How it works
In 2007 Cadbury Dairy Milk was running out of steam: sales were flatlining, the advertising model felt tired and younger drinkers were losing interest. The company was also emerging from a salmonella scare that had pulled more than a million bars off shelves and from headlines about cost-cutting.
Fallon London answered with 'Gorilla': a 90-second film in which a man in a gorilla suit plays Phil Collins' 'In the Air Tonight' in a studio. There is no product, no claim and no story — the pack appears only at the end. The work was presented under 'A Glass and a Half Full Productions', teased like a film in TV listings, and aired in premium 90-second slots during the Big Brother final and Rugby World Cup.
The absurdity worked. By the end of October, Dairy Milk value sales were up 7% and weekly sales rose 9% year on year while the ad was on air, with the highest recognition scores Hall & Partners had ever measured. Phil Collins' 1981 hit re-entered the Top 20. The IPA later measured a £4.88 return per £1 spent on 'Gorilla' and 171% more master-brand payback than previous campaigns, earning an IPA Effectiveness Silver.
Why it lands
- It inverted category logic — no foam, no taste claims, no persuasion — which made the brand feel confident and smart.
- The audience completed the meaning themselves, so the joy felt earned rather than told.
- Presenting it as a film production company turned one spot into a content brand with teasers, a website and sequels.
- Premium 90-second placement made the ad an event, and the culture did the rest — radio, press and word of mouth.
What it did
By the end of October value sales were up 7%; weekly sales rose 9% year on year while the ad ran; 'Gorilla' alone returned £4.88 per £1 spent and the master-brand payback was 171% greater than previous campaigns.
What you can take
When a category is tired of persuasion, a brand can win by changing what it stands for — joy instead of claims — and trusting audiences to connect the feeling back to the product.
Since then
'Gorilla' became the anchor of a content-led strategy — 'Eyebrows' and 'Trucks' followed — was named Campaign of the Year 2007, and won an IPA Effectiveness Silver in 2010. It is still cited as the proof that joy-based content can pay back commercially, and it reshaped how UK advertisers thought about brand entertainment for years.
Sources
- IPA Effectiveness Awards 2010: Silver Award - Cadbury Dairy Milk
- Campaign Annual 2007: Campaign of the Year - Cadbury's Dairy Milk
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