Burger King’s Moldy Whopper: Turning category tropes on their head

Anna Hamill

Burger King’s Moldy Whopper set the advertising world alight – the work was the realisation of many years spent improving the brand’s food quality, according to Fernando Machado, Burger King’s Chief Marketing Officer.

Burger King’s Moldy Whopper set the advertising world alight. Love it or hate it, the campaign – which presented fine art photography of Burger King’s signature offering in varying states of moldy decay – was not a stunt, but the realisation of many years spent improving the brand’s food quality, according to Fernando Machado, Burger King’s Chief Marketing Officer.

It was “love at first sight”, Machado said, when agency partners David Miami and INGO Sweden both put forward different versions of the idea several years ago. But Burger King was not yet ready for it. Machado wanted to wait until...

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