Actual Veggies launched in Q1 2022 after realizing that existing burger alternatives were either highly processed, frozen, bland or loaded with preservatives. They brought their chef-created, gourmet veggie burgers to the world using just farm-fresh vegetables. The burgers are now available nationwide at Sprouts and Whole Foods Market.
While it’s difficult for any new brand to start acquiring customers, Actual Veggies was entering an already competitive meat-alternative market. They knew their product was better than the well- established names’ — the hard part was letting everybody else know. When they launched, their only options seemed like outdated physical coupons or over-the-top marketing tactics, all of which were highly expensive and had no reliable way of proving ROI. They also had expensive shipping costs as a frozen product, which ruled out DTC marketing via digital paid ads that could otherwise have helped drive brand awareness and trials.
Actual Veggies began distributing their retail discounts with Aisle in April 2022 via simple ads on Facebook & Instagram that funneled users through Aisle’s lead- generating landing pages. They geo-targeted campaigns to their stores’ zip-codes, and new customers began pouring in.
A range of tactics worked well for Actual Veggies — they were able to succeed with broad brush campaigns that let them push sales in all retailers at once, yet could quickly pivot into specific retailers & offers based on priorities. The flexibility to switch off between these tactics was crucial as they were not in many stores at first, but as they rolled out into more retailers, there was frequent need to launch campaigns dedicated to particular sellers. For one campaign, they multiplied the success with Aisle by layering in referral marketing tactics. While they drove tens of thousands of sign-ups and purchases via paid ad efforts at a 23% conversion rate, they drove several- thousand more purchases and sign-ups by offering a bonus discount for referrals that saw a 54% conversion rate.
“Because the costs [of physical coupons and other trial-driving options] were so astronomical, we were barely able to do any marketing. Aisle was really our first form of marketing as a brand. It was the most cost-effective, just a great way to get our products in consumers’ hands” — Cassi Lubarsky, Director of Marketing
With Aisle, Actual Veggies was able to drive significant trials, SMS & email sign-ups, and overall brand awareness given the newfound ability to track actual purchases from confirmed new customers. They went from being virtually unable to advertise due to high costs and lack of attribution to serving 2.8M ad impressions on paid social during 2023. Beyond the obvious benefits of being able to track healthy CPAs, Actual Veggies was also an extremely helpful tool for their customer success team. As a frozen product, it was very expensive to ship their products to customers who had issues with their items, or time consuming to handwrite envelopes to provide physical coupons. Being able to offer redemptions through Aisle allowed them to quickly provide Aisle links, and significantly reduce their shipping costs, which was an unexpected benefit of the partnership.
