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Category
Integrated / Omnichannel Campaign
Annual ID
OS25_IG027M
Background
Australian Lamb - The Comment Section
The campaign where Aussie lamb unites online comment sections, written by online comment sections.
Meat and Livestock Australia promote domestic consumption of Australian Lamb.
Lamb is a smaller player in Australia’s fresh meat market, dwarfed by Chicken and Beef. Australians buy fresh meat 46 times each year, but Lamb only 8 times on average. Challenged for salience against engrained purchasing and meal behaviours. And needing to become more relevant with younger Australians to drive growth. Just as Lamb became the most expensive meat and younger Aussies were being crushed by a cost-of-living crisis.
As they have a limited budget, our approach centred around creating a campaign that utilises humour, cultural relevance and an epic-feeling scale to achieve PR, talkability and fame that goes far beyond the brand’s limited budget for investment in media.
This approach is in its 20th year, and “The Lamb Ad” has become one of Australia’s cultural advertising moments, akin to Superbowl advertising in the US or the John Lewis Christmas campaign in the UK.
The long-term Australian Lamb strategy is rooted in unity. Australian lamb meals are largely a shared experience, bringing friends and family together. Every year, this campaign focuses on uniting a divided Australia, via a Lamb BBQ.
Identifying and satirising division allows lamb to be culturally relevant and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time, generating laughs, headlines and provoking a response that can’t be bought.
In this campaign, Australian Lamb chose to unify “the comment section”, taking aim at the exaggerated division and vitriol present in social media comment forums. Every comment featured in the commercial and campaign is a REAL comment taken from real online and social comments sections - making this ‘the campaign the internet wrote’.
The campaign where Aussie lamb unites online comment sections, written by online comment sections.
Meat and Livestock Australia promote domestic consumption of Australian Lamb.
Lamb is a smaller player in Australia’s fresh meat market, dwarfed by Chicken and Beef. Australians buy fresh meat 46 times each year, but Lamb only 8 times on average. Challenged for salience against engrained purchasing and meal behaviours. And needing to become more relevant with younger Australians to drive growth. Just as Lamb became the most expensive meat and younger Aussies were being crushed by a cost-of-living crisis.
As they have a limited budget, our approach centred around creating a campaign that utilises humour, cultural relevance and an epic-feeling scale to achieve PR, talkability and fame that goes far beyond the brand’s limited budget for investment in media.
This approach is in its 20th year, and “The Lamb Ad” has become one of Australia’s cultural advertising moments, akin to Superbowl advertising in the US or the John Lewis Christmas campaign in the UK.
The long-term Australian Lamb strategy is rooted in unity. Australian lamb meals are largely a shared experience, bringing friends and family together. Every year, this campaign focuses on uniting a divided Australia, via a Lamb BBQ.
Identifying and satirising division allows lamb to be culturally relevant and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time, generating laughs, headlines and provoking a response that can’t be bought.
In this campaign, Australian Lamb chose to unify “the comment section”, taking aim at the exaggerated division and vitriol present in social media comment forums. Every comment featured in the commercial and campaign is a REAL comment taken from real online and social comments sections - making this ‘the campaign the internet wrote’.
Creative Idea
Australian Lamb is a meat often shared, so unity is at the core of the brand.
The key idea of this campaign is that Australians appear more divided online than they are in real life...at a Lamb BBQ. In the film, Australians who appear at odds with each other in forums online, are united by Australian Lamb.
We depict these social media comment sections via a striking metaphor. Commenters appear as people in stadium bleachers commenting on a subject, and then each other.
Each of these comments in the film was sourced from real online commentary, found using social listening, then written into our script, highlighting the real-life phenomena of exaggerated online division.
By presenting real social comments in this striking fashion, and showing how divided we seem online, we could resolve the situation with Australian Lamb, thereby effectively amplifying the brand message in a highly entertaining way.
The centrepiece of the campaign is the online film, and all other channels seek to drive viewership of this asset. This was achieved through PR and influencers. We also extended the idea into channels such as OOH and TV by taking comments about the new campaign and quickly turning them into billboards and 15 second TVCs promoting the viewing of the longform film via a QR code.
The key idea of this campaign is that Australians appear more divided online than they are in real life...at a Lamb BBQ. In the film, Australians who appear at odds with each other in forums online, are united by Australian Lamb.
We depict these social media comment sections via a striking metaphor. Commenters appear as people in stadium bleachers commenting on a subject, and then each other.
Each of these comments in the film was sourced from real online commentary, found using social listening, then written into our script, highlighting the real-life phenomena of exaggerated online division.
By presenting real social comments in this striking fashion, and showing how divided we seem online, we could resolve the situation with Australian Lamb, thereby effectively amplifying the brand message in a highly entertaining way.
The centrepiece of the campaign is the online film, and all other channels seek to drive viewership of this asset. This was achieved through PR and influencers. We also extended the idea into channels such as OOH and TV by taking comments about the new campaign and quickly turning them into billboards and 15 second TVCs promoting the viewing of the longform film via a QR code.
Insights & Strategy
Unlike chicken, pork, beef and seafood which are often eaten alone, Australian Lamb is most often a shared, celebratory meal, eaten by people coming together. And is the only meat that crosses Australia’s ethnic, religious and cultural diversity.
For this reason, the long-term strategy of the brand has been ‘unity’, with Australian Lamb seen as the meat that unites a nation.
This means that the audience for Australian Lamb’s summer campaign is all Aussies who buy groceries or eat out.
To reach a group this large effectively would be extremely expensive using a traditional approach, therefore the campaign aims to earn as much PR and shareability through humour and cultural relevance.
As ‘unity’ is at the core of the brand, and the campaign seeks to generate humour and cultural relevance, finding a topical, relatable division in society to discuss is essential.
With Meta’s cancellation of fact-checking, Tik Tok’s ban in America, X’s influence in global politics, and the broader debate about social media platforms and the discussion and division they encourage, the divided nature of the online world seemed to be a culturally relevant topic for lamb to satirise.
Our insight being that as a nation Aussies are far more divided online than we are in real life.
We chose to use real comments, sourced from real online comment sections, to drive home the searing truth at the heart of our insight This also helped make the film funnier and more sharable, as a lot of the real comments we found were truly bizarre, thereby helping us prove our point.
For this reason, the long-term strategy of the brand has been ‘unity’, with Australian Lamb seen as the meat that unites a nation.
This means that the audience for Australian Lamb’s summer campaign is all Aussies who buy groceries or eat out.
To reach a group this large effectively would be extremely expensive using a traditional approach, therefore the campaign aims to earn as much PR and shareability through humour and cultural relevance.
As ‘unity’ is at the core of the brand, and the campaign seeks to generate humour and cultural relevance, finding a topical, relatable division in society to discuss is essential.
With Meta’s cancellation of fact-checking, Tik Tok’s ban in America, X’s influence in global politics, and the broader debate about social media platforms and the discussion and division they encourage, the divided nature of the online world seemed to be a culturally relevant topic for lamb to satirise.
Our insight being that as a nation Aussies are far more divided online than we are in real life.
We chose to use real comments, sourced from real online comment sections, to drive home the searing truth at the heart of our insight This also helped make the film funnier and more sharable, as a lot of the real comments we found were truly bizarre, thereby helping us prove our point.
Execution
“The Comments Section” needed to be culturally relevant, sharable and above all, really really funny.
This meant that creating a tone that was funny &irreverent, without casting judgement was essential. We wanted to hold up a mirror for people to see, &laugh at themselves, but not in a judgemental or mean-spirited way. We’re a unifying brand, meaning we laugh at everyone equally.
The decision to build the campaign from real social media comments added to the strength of the idea, while also making the writing &production far more complicated. An indicative script was written, at which point we needed to source the funniest, most engaging real comments on a range of chosen topics, then write these into a script to create a script that was both hilarious &worked as a coherent narrative.
We needed to resonate with the entire nation, yet humour can be subjective. So we needed to ensure sufficient breadth of topics, observations&comments to reward Aussies of all ages &background.
Sourcing real comments required social listening on a range of different online forums, about a range of different topics. We sourced 1,000s of comments. We then had to curate &write them into a script that worked &engaged for over three minutes. This required a long timeline for writing, rewriting, &refining. The craft then continued right through the shoot &through to edit. We couldn't just “come up with lines” during filming, nor could we add them in post-production, as they needed to be real. This made the production process over 6months long.
An entertaining film forms the centrepiece of the campaign, and other elements seek to drive viewership of the main online film. Media activity &the film launchin early January &there is a heavy push during that month.
We reckon the effort was worth it. Millions of Aussies agreed.
This meant that creating a tone that was funny &irreverent, without casting judgement was essential. We wanted to hold up a mirror for people to see, &laugh at themselves, but not in a judgemental or mean-spirited way. We’re a unifying brand, meaning we laugh at everyone equally.
The decision to build the campaign from real social media comments added to the strength of the idea, while also making the writing &production far more complicated. An indicative script was written, at which point we needed to source the funniest, most engaging real comments on a range of chosen topics, then write these into a script to create a script that was both hilarious &worked as a coherent narrative.
We needed to resonate with the entire nation, yet humour can be subjective. So we needed to ensure sufficient breadth of topics, observations&comments to reward Aussies of all ages &background.
Sourcing real comments required social listening on a range of different online forums, about a range of different topics. We sourced 1,000s of comments. We then had to curate &write them into a script that worked &engaged for over three minutes. This required a long timeline for writing, rewriting, &refining. The craft then continued right through the shoot &through to edit. We couldn't just “come up with lines” during filming, nor could we add them in post-production, as they needed to be real. This made the production process over 6months long.
An entertaining film forms the centrepiece of the campaign, and other elements seek to drive viewership of the main online film. Media activity &the film launchin early January &there is a heavy push during that month.
We reckon the effort was worth it. Millions of Aussies agreed.
Results
Australian Lamb’s “The Comment Section” campaign launched on 6 January 2025.
The impact was seen immediately through national and international press coverage, with over 700 individual articles earning Lamb over 180 million opportunities to see.
Total completed views of the online film sit at 20,140,158 on 11 February 2025. Viewership of this asset is one of the main objectives of the campaign, as it drives Lamb’s salience, brand affinity and consideration. This figure more than doubles the campaign aim of 10M views over the campaign period.
Engagement has been overwhelmingly positive with Aussies and non-Aussies alike, with many comments branding this not only ‘the best lamb ad of all time’, but the ‘greatest ad I think I will ever see in my lifetime’. The commercial became the most viewed Australian ad by Australians on YouTube ever.
This has solidified Australian Lamb’s positioning as the meat that unites Aussies. Upon launch, Australian butchers and Australian supermarkets have reported a spike in sales due to overwhelming demand. At time of submission longer term business outcomes are yet to be seen, however based on previous campaigns with similar levels metrics, an increase in value of between 12 and 20 in sales is seen compared to the prior year. Available data indicates the campaign will reach or surpass this.
The impact was seen immediately through national and international press coverage, with over 700 individual articles earning Lamb over 180 million opportunities to see.
Total completed views of the online film sit at 20,140,158 on 11 February 2025. Viewership of this asset is one of the main objectives of the campaign, as it drives Lamb’s salience, brand affinity and consideration. This figure more than doubles the campaign aim of 10M views over the campaign period.
Engagement has been overwhelmingly positive with Aussies and non-Aussies alike, with many comments branding this not only ‘the best lamb ad of all time’, but the ‘greatest ad I think I will ever see in my lifetime’. The commercial became the most viewed Australian ad by Australians on YouTube ever.
This has solidified Australian Lamb’s positioning as the meat that unites Aussies. Upon launch, Australian butchers and Australian supermarkets have reported a spike in sales due to overwhelming demand. At time of submission longer term business outcomes are yet to be seen, however based on previous campaigns with similar levels metrics, an increase in value of between 12 and 20 in sales is seen compared to the prior year. Available data indicates the campaign will reach or surpass this.
2025 Awards
Total Points: 3
Merit
Credits
Agency
Droga5 ANZ, part of Accenture Song / Sydney
Media Agency
UM Media
PR / Marketing Agency
One Green Bean
Production Company
The Sweetshop
Alt Vfx
Music / Sound Production Company
MassiveMusic
Chief Creative Officer
Tara Ford
Creative Director
Hugh Gurney
Joe Sibley
Editor
Joe Morris
Producer
Jane Smith
Sound Designer
Simon Kane
DoP
Crighton Bone
Executive Producer
Eyvonne Carfora
Kate Roydhouse
Katrina Aquilla
Post Art Director
Ben Fesselet
Business Director
Harrison Stone
Business Executive
Matthew Stafford
Business Strategy Director
Kit Lansdell
Casting
Danny Long
Chief Executive Officer
Matt Michael
Co MD
Edward Pontifex
Greg Fyson
Colourist
Fergus Rotherham
Director
Max Barden
Head of Business Management
Topher Jones
Head of Production
Penny Brown
Music Composition
Haydn Walker
Senior Creative
Aïcha Wijland
Ewan Harvey
VFX Producer
Malinda McGuire
VFX Supervisor
Dave Edwards
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