Organic Valley Brings the Farm to the City as Part of Climate Week NYC

Through the lens of a National Geographic photographer, the small family farms in the Organic Valley co-op look like national parks teeming with flora and fauna—honey bees, songbirds, rolling hills and native trees among them. And, of course, there’s an abundance of free-roaming cows.

So why is one land mass protected, while the other isn’t?

The question is at the heart of Organic Valley’s new campaign, which debuts alongside the brand’s first sponsorship of the currently running Climate Week NYC, an annual gathering of world leaders, business moguls, scientists and activists. 

In one of its most significant marketing pushes to date, the grocery store staple introduces the new tagline “Protecting Where Your Food Comes From,” with video ads from longtime agency Humanaut that mimic wildlife documentaries, complete with British-accented narrator.

The spots are part of a broader effort that includes a two-day pop-up at Rockefeller Center—which brings the farm to urbanites—subway takeovers, outdoor ads and hand-painted murals, retail sampling and in-store programs.

The brand aims to encourage consumers to help preserve these small businesses—100,000 family farms have disappeared in the past decade alone, per the U.S. Department of Agriculture, with only 2,500 organic farmers remaining—and show the ripple effect of their loss.

“We want to reignite people’s interest in small family farms in America,” Jaclyn Cardin, chief brand officer at Organic Valley, told Adweek. “If we don’t band together, there will be a lot more industrial farms and a lot less farms that are protecting biodiversity.”

There’s an added incentive to promote the premium brand at a time when consumers say they want ethically-sourced products, but they’re price sensitive because of ongoing inflation.

Small farm, big city

While consumers increasingly say they want to know where their food originates, most have never set foot onto a farm of any type, per a recent Harris Poll. With that research in mind, Organic Valley decided to bring a version of an organic farmstead to the heart of New York.

Starting today and continuing through Thursday, those attending Climate Week NYC events and members of the public can tour the brand-themed green space at Rock Center’s Channel Gardens. The experiential stunt, from HangarFour Creative, includes hands-on activities, photo ops and product sampling.

Attendees can sit on a tractor, strike up a conversation with an organic farmer, look at life-sized animal topiaries and learn to milk a cow via a specially-designed prop. (Organic Valley’s animals don’t travel for their own welfare). 

While visiting the red barn, duck pond and other areas, consumers can buy sustainably-made merchandise and learn about organic farming techniques that produce 24% less greenhouse gas emissions than traditional dairy farms, per the brand.

“What we often see is a one-sided view presented of animal agriculture, and people think they have to cut out meat and dairy entirely to lessen their environmental impact,” Cardin said. “We want to pull back the curtain and show what organically sourced dairy looks like—because not all dairy is created equal.”

Stewards of the land

Additional elements of the campaign that Cardin dubbed “non-fiction marketing” include radio and podcast spots, along with paid social and digital outreach, and a subway takeover in Midtown Manhattan that recreates a farm scene.

Out-of-home ads and murals, as well as bus wraps, will expand beyond New York in the coming weeks to Boston, Atlanta and Denver. The four key markets also have programs at Whole Foods that will sample products and give away swag via secret shoppers.

At the same time, the brand has given its packaging a makeover, with illustrated milk cartons being the first to hit retailers. The new look will roll out across the product line over the next six months, Cardin said.

A 90-second hero ad, along with cutdowns, will air on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Hulu and Amazon. Its creative takes a swipe at industrial agriculture and intends to “bust through a lot of greenwashing claims” by highlighting farmers and their “stewardship of the land and animals” with an assist from a Nat Geo photojournalist, Cardin said.

Farmers in the 35-year-old co-op work 400,000 acres of pesticide-free pastures, with the Humanaut team focusing on the “life, beauty and valuable resources” found there, per Bethany Maxfield, the agency’s creative director. “We’re making land that would otherwise be overlooked into something heroic.”

“Protecting Where Your Food Comes From,” developed with Organic Valley’s in-house team in a style and tone befitting the Discovery Channel, becomes the umbrella tagline that Cardin says will continue “for the foreseeable future.”