Farmed and Dangerous: A Look At Farming From Chipotle

This post was written by Claire Meyer

Chipotle graced the Social Media Week stages, sharing free gift cards and the keys to their unbranded content marketing strategy to highlight the recent premiere of their new show on Hulu.com, “Farmed and Dangerous.”

Chipotle CMO Mark Crumpacker explained that a lot of Chipotle’s success as a brand and as a restaurant chain stems from its authenticity: “We are doing what we’re saying we’re doing…there’s a lot less skepticism.”

Chipotle’s food sustainability programs are transparent, as are the company’s motives: “We’re trying to create a change in the industry more than we’re trying to sell burritos.”

Mark continued, explaining Chipotle just wants to educate consumers and spark a discussion on where their food comes from. “Farmed and Dangerous” is poised to do just that, without sacrificing entertainment value. Daniel Rosenberg, of the “Farmed and Dangerous” production team, stressed that Chipotle execs respected the need for creative, entertaining content: “[Chipotle] gets the message out, but they understand it’s a sub priority to entertainment and humor.”

Given the lack of explicit branding in the series, all speakers stressed the need to spark conversation to make the series a success. It’s an interesting challenge and approach for a brand to take — one marketers and brands will be looking to as the results unfold.

Claire Meyer is a senior at New York University studying Integrated Communications, Media, and Web Programming. Follow her on Twitter at @CMeyer4.

Claire is one of our SMW Press Corps members, managed by OpenCommunications. Learn more here.