For more than 40 years, Good Food has shaped how Australians cook, dine, and discover food. As food content has proliferated, however, the competitive set has expanded far beyond traditional publishers to include creators, platforms, and other free alternatives.
This shift has created an industry-wide challenge. In an environment where content is abundant (and often free), attribution is weakening, and brand distinction is harder to maintain. As a result, audiences increasingly remember a dish or restaurant, not the source.
Good Food was not immune to this. The introduction of a paid subscription model made it critical to clearly articulate why Good Food’s expertise adds value beyond what is freely available.
While around half of Australians aged 18+ were familiar with the brand, 30% had never engaged with it. The issue was not awareness but salience and consideration.
With its brand campaign, Good Food sought to build awareness with a broader audience.
Delivering Good Food to new audiences
At the centre of the campaign was our new brand platform: We know Good Food.
The platform — which celebrates our unrivalled culinary intel — was developed to reposition the brand as an essential companion for food lovers and re-establish Good Food as the authority on food.
The campaign had four clear objectives:
Build awareness and consideration among food-loving Australians.
Differentiate from free and commoditised food content.
Reinforce authority and relevance, particularly with younger audiences.
Increase belief that Good Food is worth paying for.
The strategy was shaped by a clear tension. While Good Food had strong brand awareness, it was not always the first choice for audiences. At the same time, audience behaviour pointed to an opportunity. Research showed 72% of audiences prioritise quality over price, and 64% of audiences in Sydney and Melbourne are open to paying for food content.
The campaign’s role was to bridge that gap, connecting Good Food’s expertise to the food moments people care about most and making its value clear in a way people could feel.
Bringing the campaign to life
Working with leading creative agency Publicis Worldwide Australia, we brought Good Food’s culinary expertise to life through the “We know Good Food” campaign.
Using a category-first “bullet time” technique, we captured a series of everyday food moments in clutter-busting 3D — from a dinner party mid-conversation to the first bite at a restaurant to a cherished home-cooked meal — demonstrating how Good Food’s intel can make each scenario more memorable.
The striking photography used in the campaign was part of its unique appeal.
The campaign ran across TV, audio, outdoor, print, digital and social to drive scale and consistency.
Two playful, interactive out-of-home activations — Good Food’s “Dinner Decider” and “Restaurant Roulette” — were also created to bring the idea to life and give audiences first-hand experience with Good Food’s culinary intel.
Installed at bus shelters across Sydney and Melbourne, they served up randomised dinner recipe suggestions and restaurant recommendations, giving time-poor Australians quick, easy answers to the daily “what’s for dinner” dilemma.
By connecting Good Food’s content directly to these real-world moments, the activations demonstrated the brand’s expertise in a way that audiences could act on immediately by engaging with the content and continuing their journey on site.
Serving up success
The campaign delivered strong results across awareness, perception, and engagement. Over six weeks, it reached more than 99% of food-loving Australians aged 25-54 in Sydney and Melbourne, successfully reestablishing Good Food as a modern, authoritative brand at scale.
That reach translated into action, increasing traffic to the Good Food landing page by 40x over the campaign period, allowing us to start conversations with thousands of new potential customers. Campaign recall reached 53%, indicating strong memorability in a highly cluttered category.
Post-campaign research also showed clear shifts in brand perception:
57% of respondents agreed that Good Food is an authority on food.
80% said they were more likely to consider reading Good Food.
72% were more likely to subscribe.
42% showed stronger agreement that it is worth paying for.
The campaign established Good Food as an authority on recipes and restaurants alike.
What we learned
A few things became clear through this campaign.
First, in a category saturated with free food content, simply producing more content isn’t enough. Good Food already had awareness, but the shift came from clearly articulating its value and defining what it offers that others don’t.
Second, connecting that value to real, recognisable moments made the difference. By showing how Good Food can help make food moments more memorable, it became seen as more relevant and useful to our audiences.
Finally, how that story was told mattered. Rather than traditional food advertising, the film-first approach created something more cinematic and premium, reinforcing Good Food’s expertise and authority in the category.
In a market where free alternatives dominate, the takeaway is straightforward. When the value is clear and grounded in real experiences, audiences are willing to pay for it.
Annabel Nicholas is the marketing manager — brand and acquisition Good Food in for Sydney, NSW, Australia. She can be reached at annabel.nicholas@nine.com.au.
