ADdicted: Gordon Ramsay X Uber Eats

Gordon Ramsay X Uber Eats might appear as an odd collaboration to some: after all, one is a Michelin-starred chef, and the other is a food-delivery service.

But this juxtaposition is one of the reasons why Uber Eats' "Who Could Cook at a Time Like This?" ad works so well.

The premise of the ad is straightforward: if you're cooking, you're not watching the World Cup, and you'd be better off letting Uber Eats handle the food so you don't miss any of the excitement.

"You have better things to do than cook" is not an original idea. In fact, I led the execution of an almost identical concept in 2009 when I led Pizza Hut Canada's Tuscani Pastas business. We wanted to show people how ordering Pizza Hut's new Tuscani Pastas for dinner would leave more time to do the things they loved, and we chose to do that using a series of increasingly exaggerated depictions of Mom pursuing her passions.* The ad earned a prestigious award from the Global CMO of Pizza Hut at the time (Brian Niccol, who is now Starbucks' CEO) for being the most insights-driven ad aired anywhere in the world that quarter.

But the execution of Uber Eats' ad goes far beyond its simple premise, and it helps make the spot what it is.

First, Gordon Ramsey is not just famous; he's famous for being a meticulous, unforgiving perfectionist of a chef. So for him to be seen delivering food to stop people from preparing it themselves is striking and memorable. Is the food being delivered Michelin-star quality? No, likely not. But having Ramsey deliver it certainly gives a "quality halo" to the brand.

Second, this is a World Cup ad without being a "World Cup ad". The excitement surrounding this year's World Cup is very clearly the backdrop for this ad, but that's made clear through Ramsey's sarcastic dialogue ("One last corner, ten seconds before the whistle, and you think this is a good time to fillet a sea bass?", "It's penalties, and you're doing a jambalya."), not by mentioning the tournament's proper name directly. And that's critical, since Uber Eats isn't an official sponsor of the World Cup, and you can bet not having to pay FIFA millions of dollars helped free up the budget needed to secure Ramsey's participation.

Lastly, while prominent product placement in an ad can be distracting when done poorly, the bright green Uber Eats delivery bags featured throughout this ad are an integrated part of the narrative, so they don't ever seem out of place.

Gordon Ramsey may be the celebrity in this entertaining spot, but Uber Eats is the hero.

And when you're a brand paying big bucks to develop and distribute an advertisement, that's exactly what you want to achieve.

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P.S. This ad is incredibly entertaining, but will it be effective? According to System1, a market research and data analytics firm that helps brands test the effectiveness of their advertisements, the answer is a resounding YES! With a hat-tip to Andrew Tindall for sharing this on his LinkedIn feed, you can read the full ad testing research for this ad here.

* Fun fact: in the ad, the Pizza Hut delivery driver's name is "Dave"; that's the shortened version of my name and the name of the person who was my manager at that time. Coincidence? Nope! :)