We’re not just an agency we’re a marketer, as well. Just like any brand, we have a story to tell and need to find unique and compelling ways to create a dialogue with our consumers (marketing decision makers). Given our heritage and experience in the restaurant category, we identified it as a primary target. The question was, how do we engage this target in a cost-effective and differentiating way? How can we separate ourselves from not just other marketing agencies, but from the hundreds of other vendors seeking attention from restaurant decision-makers?

We had three objectives.
1. Create awareness for G&M within the restaurant industry.
2. Demonstrate our knowledge of the category.
3. Create something that would spread virally throughout the community.

Rather than run our own ads in industry publications and websites, or mass-mail G&M credentials packages to every restaurant brand in the country, we decided to do something a little different. We created our own digital media vehicle on which we would advertise G&M Plumbing.

And so Food Chain Month Daily was born. A light-hearted satirical website and email newsletter about the restaurant industry.

With only a few hundred e-mail addresses in our database, we launched our first issue. Within minutes, requests to be added to the list came flooding in. It was featured in Nations Restaurant News blogs and in QSR Magazine. We received e-mails from CEOs, CFOs, COOs and CMOs applauding the effort, saying they forward every issue to their entire staff. Our database has grown to over 3,200 names as we continue to get more requests to be added with every new issue.

Food Chain Month Daily exceeded all three of our original objectives. What began as a self-promotion idea has now become its own profit center, with an online store and plans for advertiser support and a hardcover book. More than anything, it’s an example of what a great idea, a lot of hard work and an out-of-pocket cost of $70 can do.