“Mother Knows Best”
Real Client Work | Social Media | Video
Mother Bear’s Pizza
Background
Every year, a new cohort of IU freshmen enter the Bloomington consumer market. Many, if not most, of these students do not yet have a go-to pizza place in town.
Objective
For a class campaign project, I was asked to convince IU freshmen to eat more Pizza through a general category poster campaign.
As Mother Bear's is a local category leader, rising interest in Pizza will translate to rising sales.
Insight
I discovered that what freshmen all really wanted (beyond passing calculus) is connection. As a freshman, it's likely one's first time living alone and one's likely living somewhere different than their hometown. So, a major priority at this age is building friendships. With bars and clubs largely out of reach, the pizza place is a great spot to build those bonds. In short, the local pizza joint is a place where friends become best friends.
Execution
It's not about the pizza. It never was.
I've been to Mother Bear's myself, and the one thing they cook up better than pie is memories. The goofy get-togethers. The spit-takes. The "you-had-to-be-there" moments. We've all been there. My two posters are snapshots of those warm, cozy, rosy moments we hope to cherish for decades. Essentially, the toppings are negotiable. The location is negotiable. As long as there's a table we can claim as "ours," that's what matters. And at Mother Bear's, everyone seats themselves. It was from that line of thinking that the "find your table" tagline took form. From there, I spoke to freshmen in their terms, competing against the convenience of dining halls and demonstrating how the pizza place turns unassuming floormates into besties for life.
I then pitched the project to Mother Bear’s, and through a series of refinements we distilled Mother Bear’s promise into the phrase, “Mother knows best,” posting her message on local buses and on the restaurant’s socials: Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.
These two queen-sized panels, based on the original concept, were actually purchased by Mother Bear’s and
placed on the side of two Bloomington city buses, circulating the city between August 2024-March 2025.
Additional concepts below were proposed but not chosen by client.
Additional social media work
Includes copywriting, art direction, and video (see video in film+video)
