Consumers were sending messages with photographs of Noblice with an inverted biscuit part. Jaffa Crvenka was receiving similar complaints by email, and the cause was a problem on the production line. For the creative team, the decisive moment was the client’s invitation to consider whether they could do something with the situation. The mistake did not affect the quality or safety of the biscuits, which made it possible to open a conversation about what had confused and bothered consumers.
The starting point was already there in the brand’s character. The song “Noblice, Noblice” and the cheerfulness of its communication opened up room for a completely different character: an evil twin from the same world, one who disrupts its sweet balance. The inverted biscuit thus gained a name, a character and a little story of its own, while Zloblica gave the audience a reason to get involved.
Consumers were invited to report their cases, after which they received packages of regular Noblice for their “emotional distress”. This was followed by a red thread with a Noblica as protection against the evil twin, while one comment grew into a convincingly written “lawsuit” and then into a PR article on business portals. Each new reaction provided material for further communication. The people who first pointed out the mistake also participated in developing its character.
In the next instalment of the Behind the Winning Idea series, we speak with Žiška agency about how Zloblica came to life, what needed to be checked before a production mistake became the subject of a joke, and how an exchange with consumers developed into a story that the community embraced and continued building.
When the first photographs of “upside-down” Noblice began arriving in your inbox, what was decisive in recognising a communication opportunity in the situation rather than treating it merely as a complaint?
In our correspondence with the client about the messages arriving in DMs, we learned that they were receiving similar consumer complaints by email and that the problem had occurred on the production line. The client then told us: “Come on, see if you can do something with this.” For us, this was an excellent creative challenge, because we recognised an opportunity in a specific consumer insight to turn an apparent shortcoming into authentic communication.
This way of working, in which we start from consumers’ real experiences and comments, is how we worked with Jaffa Crvenka, as can also be seen in the Kasato example.
Consumers were sending complaints by email about how difficult the packaging was to open, so we came up with the Kasato Hook, a practical solution that we distributed to people and that enabled them to open the packaging more easily. The idea also connected naturally with the Pirate, an existing brand asset.
In both cases, we started from a real experience and a problem that consumers themselves had identified and contacted us about. Those apparent shortcomings gave us room to develop communication that was authentic, relevant and characteristic of the brand.
How much time passed between the first consumer reports and Zloblica’s appearance on social media, and what did that pace require of the agency and the client?
At first, consumers contacted us sporadically to report biscuits with an inverted part. We did not have a predefined plan for what to do with this, but we recognised an interesting insight in those reactions: something that was unexpected and slightly irritating for the consumer opened up room for a creative interpretation for us.
That is how Zloblica came about, as a personification of that “problem”, but also as a much broader idea around which we could build an entire story.
From that moment on, we began developing it systematically through digital communication. First, we announced that Zloblica existed, then invited consumers to report their cases, and sent everyone who contacted us a package of regular Noblice for their “emotional distress”.
As the story gained momentum, we added new elements based on the community’s reactions, so in the end we also distributed a red thread with a Noblica as a form of protection against Zloblica.
In this way, we turned a small, authentic signal coming directly from consumers into a carefully designed and strategically managed digital platform. The key was that the communication did not feel like a campaign constructed in advance, but like a natural continuation of what was already happening between the brand and its community.
Consumers recognised their contribution to the story, readily got involved, reported new cases and gave it additional life through their reactions. The most interesting example is that of a gentleman who wrote a very convincing lawsuit against Zloblica in a comment, and that very “lawsuit” became another element of the campaign in the form of a PR article on business portals.
A physically inverted biscuit became an “evil twin” with her own name, voice and character. What did you build Zloblica’s personality on, and how far could she depart from the tone of the familiar Noblica?
We started from the fact that this was a physically inverted Noblica and thought about that very concept of being “inverted”. One of Noblica’s strongest brand assets is certainly the famous song “Noblice, Noblice” and, more generally, one of the most recognisable advertisements here. It evokes optimism, cheerfulness and pleasant feelings in people, and for years this has been part of the image they have of the brand.
So we followed this line of thinking: if Noblica is all of that, what is her opposite? If she is cheerful, this one must be evil; if she is positive, this one must have a completely different character. That is how the name Zloblica came quite naturally. We created her “inverted” version, while ensuring that she remained recognisable enough as part of the Noblice world.
Publicly turning a production mistake into entertainment could have drawn additional attention to the error itself. What needed to be checked and agreed upon before the campaign launched, and what role did the reward mechanism play in turning the mistake into a game with the audience?
The foundation of everything was that this mistake did not affect the quality or safety of the biscuits in any way, nor did it put consumers in any danger. If any of that had been in question, this kind of communication would not have been possible. Once we had that confirmed, we could focus on how to turn the situation itself into entertainment and involve the audience through a reward mechanism.
Good brand work does not mean denying shortcomings, but recognising opportunities in them and turning them into an advantage. That is how a brand’s character is actually built.
Pringles is an excellent example of this approach. Consumers complained that their hands got stuck in the deep can while trying to take out the last crisp, and the brand used that frustration as a creative motif and developed the Stuck in platform. In one advertisement, they even showed a man whose hand had been stuck for so long that he eventually had to go on living with the can on his hand. This turned a real consumer problem into an absurd and entertaining story that naturally belonged to the brand’s character.
We approached Noblice in a similar way: consumer reports of biscuits with an inverted part became the creative input from which Zloblica emerged, followed by an entire communication effort around her.
With a production and media budget of less than 500 euros, Zloblica generated almost 670,000 views, more than 5,000 interactions and 3,500 shares, and won gold at BalCannes in the Best Social Media Idea category. Based on your insight, what contributed most to that organic response and showed that the idea had value beyond a single reactive moment?
Social media is, on the one hand, a place where carefully polished images of life, people and brands are often created. On the other hand, it is precisely there that people show a much more realistic, self-critical side through memes, relatable situations in reels videos and humour. To some extent, the community expects that kind of authenticity from brands too, because it makes them feel more real and closer to them.
Zloblica was exactly that. We did not try to hide the situation or smooth it over, but took something that had really happened and turned it into a character, a story and a game that people could join. People built on the content very naturally and began developing it further through their reactions, which is one of the most wonderful parts of the entire campaign, alongside the creative process itself.
An additional layer of familiarity came from “Zlobnica”, a series that aired in this region around thirty years ago and is part of our collective cultural memory. That also made the whole idea familiar and interesting to people.
