You can’t name the customer.

A contract manufacturer’s best argument is its customer list. It is also the one thing it cannot say out loud.

Supply agreements keep those names confidential. So the category defaults to talking about plants, formulation processes, and quality assurance, and every company in it sounds identical.

Make the restriction the ad.

One execution names the chains and the products, then blacks them out. The reader fills in what is under the bars, which is exactly the point: you already know this food, you just did not know who made it.

The legal problem, used as the headline instead of worked around.

The rest of the campaign built the platform the redacted ad pays off. Partnership rather than product. The company’s founding story. What a signature taste is worth to somebody whose name goes on it.

Thirty-five dollars borrowed from a grandmother’s cookie jar in 1936, which is a better opening than anything about formulation.

Originated the line behind the campaign. Recognized with a Davey Award, Silver.