In a press release replete with Madison Avenue jargon and buzz-words but short on specifics, Emily Metz, president and CEO of the American Egg Board announced the Meant to be Broken promotional campaign. She stated, “We see it as the first step in a multi-year journey – a movement and a call to action to rediscover eggs and their potential to support the goals and lifestyles of a complex consumer.”
She added, “It’s also a rallying cry for an industry that has seen its share of recent challenges. We have been on a journey on behalf of America’s egg farmers, to break out of our own status quo and explore the opportunities brought forward through risk-taking. The American Egg Board regards the campaign as a “novel message and a fresh approach to create real excitement about the valuable ways eggs can help redefine a love of food.”
Edward Hoffman, Vice-president of marketing, communications 
at the AEB stated, “Leveraging this knowledge, we repositioned eggs from an often overlooked and underappreciated kitchen staple with specific uses to an indispensable food or ingredient with unlimited potential to support their active, often hectic lives.”
The campaign will include “video spots, custom messaging to targeted audiences across TV, online, video and cross-screen display. A user-generated content challenge with influencers on TikTok (if it survives) is intended to generate recipes with new ideas and methods of preparation.
Metz correctly states, “Our success will be marked by people reaching for eggs more often and with more joy and excitement.” The ultimate measure of success will be a quantitative increase in domestic egg consumption at prices that offer positive margins. Specific figures will determine the success of the Meant to Be Broken campaign as an attempt to stimulate consumption. The industry will be more interested in actual increases in consumption at prices offering both producers and retailers favorable margins than the number of views on social media, self-serving accolades, awards or other advertising metrics.
At the end of the day, most consumers regard eggs as eggs, and basically they purchase eggs when the household refrigerator runs low. Some demographics do however display brand loyalty based on attributes including organic, cage-free status or nutritional enhancement. The value of national brands is being eroded by the proliferation of widely promoted private brands based on availability, competitive pricing and shelf positioning.
If the AEB campaign increases consumption by stimulating demand then it will be successful and expended check-off dollars will be justified. The effect will be difficult to measure but let us hope.