Dunkin’ reunites two Spice Girls for a pumpkin spice campaign

Dunkin’ says it has found a sixth Spice Girl. In a campaign the chain announced on 8 September, Emma Bunton and Geri Halliwell-Horner reunite to remember a long-lost bandmate called Pumpkin Spice, played by the comedian Rachel Dratch. The account of the campaign here comes from Dunkin’s own announcement.

Rachel Dratch plays a bandmate who left pop for lattes

The story the advert tells is simple. Pumpkin Spice was in the group, left to follow her love of coffee, and is now back. Baby Spice and Ginger Spice reminisce about her in the main film.

Dratch said in the release that the character was ahead of her time. Dunkin’ has not named the agency behind the work.

The film runs on YouTube, social and in shops

The chain says the campaign runs across video, its own social accounts and in-store promotion. It is built around the Pumpkin Spice Signature Latte and the rest of the autumn drinks and bakery range, which returned on 19 August.

Timing matters more than usual here. Pumpkin season in American coffee retail is a short, crowded window, and every large chain launches into the same few weeks.

Nineties nostalgia is doing a lot of work in advertising

Reaching for a band that peaked in 1997 is a bet on two audiences at once: people who remember the Spice Girls and younger viewers who meet them as an internet artefact. It is cheap recognition, and it saves the brand from explaining the joke.

Celebrity and creator deals keep getting bigger on the same logic. Google signed MrBeast to promote Gemini and Fitbit, while some brands skip the famous face and buy attention another way, as Dr. Squatch did by hiding a million dollars with IShowSpeed.

What a seasonal launch tells other food marketers

The lesson is not the celebrity. It is that Dunkin’ built one idea that works as a film, a set of social clips and a shop poster, and did not need a different concept for each. Brands that plan the opposite way spend the same money and get three campaigns nobody connects.

It also sits against a market where large food companies are cutting budgets and moving them online, as Campbell’s did this week with 85 per cent of its working media.