Mars recycles old ads for M&Ms, Twix to promote net-zero progress

Dive Brief:

• Mars Inc. launched a campaign, “Healthy Planet Productions,” that reworks popular ads with new messages about the company’s progress around climate action. By voicing over old ads and using simple animation, the effort leaves a lighter environmental footprint, according to a press release.
• The campaign includes ads originally for Mars brands including M&Ms, Twix and Ben’s Original. The new spots will run in the U.S., U.K. and Mexico across Meta platforms and YouTube and include out-of-home activations in select markets.
• “Healthy Planet Productions” follows the September publication of Mars’ Net Zero Roadmap and is informed by recent survey data that found 69% of adults want businesses to focus on tackling climate change as much as or even more than economic issues.

Dive Insight:

Billed as a first-of-its-kind digital and out-of-home campaign for the company, “Healthy Planet Productions” allows Mars to raise consumer awareness around climate action while showcasing the ways it is following its own net-zero roadmap, from working with farmers to protect forests to sourcing renewable electricity, per Andrew Clarke, global president of Mars Wrigley.

″[Consumers] share our urgency in tackling climate change, but it’s not always clear what companies are doing to deliver real change. That is why we decided to use our iconic brands in the adverts consumers know and love and deliver a message of hope and optimism on climate change,” the executive said in the press release.

The new spots reuse old ones, cutting emissions by removing the need for travel, filming and set production. They also include new voiceovers and simple 2D animation that is less emission-intensive than other techniques, per the release.

The campaign will highlight different brands across countries: M&Ms, Twix and Ben’s Original in the U.S.; M&Ms, Twix and Bounty candy in the U.K. and M&Ms in Mexico. A Twix ad featuring the “Left Twix” and “Right Twix” factories is now about how Mars uses more than 50% renewable electricity, including from wind, while an ad featuring the M&Ms spokescandies in a boardroom is now about Mars’ plans to lower emissions.

The approach is informed by an Ipsos survey commissioned by Mars that found that 69% of adults think companies should focus the same amount (32%) or more (37%) on climate change rather than economic challenges, demonstrating how marketing around the environment can resonate with consumers, even as other purpose-driven initiatives face backlash. The research surveyed more than 14,000 people from the world’s seven largest economies: the U.S., U.K., China, Japan, Germany, France and India.

Mars in September published its Net Zero Roadmap, making plans to invest $1 billion over the next three years to drive climate action on a variety of fronts. The plan is an example of how many advertisers have set net-zero and near-term targets while ad agencies and production companies have lagged behind, per a recent Ad Net Zero report.