2026 Winner

CASE SUMMARY

After several years of investing in basketball, KFC made a strategic pivot in its sports strategy towards Canada's most popular sport – hockey. But along with that pivot came heavy competition from brands like McDonald's and Tim Hortons who collectively out-spend the rest of the QSR industry by 64%.

As first time sponsors of the Winnipeg Jets, heading into the playoffs, the brand needed to break through the clutter without simply outspending the competition in order to win in Winnipeg.

The agency’s approach was simple but powerful: fuse KFC’s most distinctive brand assets with the rituals Jets’ fans care about most. Because in sports, sponsorships succeed when they feel like an extension of fan passion, not just a logo buy.

They replaced the Colonel’s face with Connor’s across buckets and in-store, showed up rinkside, and created a new playoff rally prop. This embedded KFC directly into Jets fandom and playoff culture.

As new sponsors of the Winnipeg Jets, who were heading into the NHL playoffs, KFC needed to find an unmistakable way into Winnipeg’s hockey culture. Within the sea of existing team sponsors with bigger budgets and longer-standing partnerships, breaking through in an ownable way wasn’t going to be easy.

They needed a connection no other brand could claim to drive sales and attention for KFC – and the agency found two.

Two unique intersections between KFC and The Jets: Dressing in white (Jets’ Whiteout
playoff tradition + Colonel’s suit) and the KFC acronym (Jets’ star Kyle Connor’s nickname, Kyle F*cking Connor + the brand name).

“Kyle F*cking Connor” – a sponsorship like no other, born from tapping into hockey fandom and finding the intersection between what Winnipeg Jets’ fans take pride in, and the things that are unmistakably KFC.

These two unique connections allowed us to naturally make KFC part of Winnipeg’s Whiteout.

They started by reimagining the iconic bucket as the “Kyle F*cking Connor” Whiteout Bucket,’ swapping the Colonel’s face for Connor’s, and creating the newest playoff rally prop. Then, they fully rebranded a Winnipeg KFC restaurant as “Kyle F*cking Connor”,featuring the new Kyle logo on the storefront.

The agency spread a “Let’s Go KFC” rallying cry across the city in OOH, and in-arena through DED boards.
And when the Jets’ advanced in the playoffs, the Colonel showed up to The Whiteout in his all white suit, and was joined by popular hockey influencers, engaging with fans at the game and handing out rebranded Kyle buckets for them to sport in the movement.
They also worked with Winnipeg Sports Talk’s podcast to talk about the sponsorship events for podcast listeners, and on social, they kept fans in the know, posting organic BTS and working with influencers to spread their message far and wide to more fans.

This wasn’t sponsorship as usual. This was turning sponsorship into culture.

The impact strategy had on this project began long before creative teams got working on it. Part of the strategic planners’ job is to outline where the brand can ownably play, and on KFC that always starts with identifying where the intersections are with their distinctive assets. And their strongest distinctive asset is their name – which happened to also be Kyle Connor’s nickname amongst hockey fans.

While the goal is to give creatives a sandbox to play within, the strategic planners’ rigorous research ultimately uncovered this intersection, and was the creative spark in the brief that this entire campaign was built off of.

The impact was immediate and undeniable. KFC saw a 22% increase in store sales, a 358% leap in brand affinity, a 355% lift in total earned impressions and $364 million in earned media value. The campaign dominated sports media, landing coverage on ESPN, Fox Sports, Sportsnet, Barstool, and more. The audience didn’t just see the sponsorship – they wore it, shared it, celebrated it, and made it part of Jets’ playoff culture.

Beyond sales, brand affinity, earned impressions and earned media value, the campaign
achieved 9.4 million earned impressions on social, with 111 earned social posts, 107 earned media stories, as well as 1 million paid impressions.

Online, people created versions of the brand’s Whiteout Bucket to fit on their dogs head. And one couple brought a bunch of them to their wedding during the playoffs.

The campaign was also nominated for an NHL Stanley Business award, and was a top 3
finalist in the Sponsorship Activation category.

KFC didn’t just sponsor the team, KFC became part of the Winnipeg Jets’ playoff experience. Through the perfect collision of brand assets and fan rituals, the agency turned a sponsorship into a cultural phenomenon and cemented KFC’s place in Jets’ playoff tradition.

Credits

Agency
Courage Inc.
Founder + CCO: Dhaval Bhatt
Founder + CCO: Joel Holtby
Partner + President: Niki Sahni
Partner + CSO: Tom Kenny
Partner + EP: Clair Galea
Copywriter: Zac Smith
Art Director: Zeina Elshurafa
Head of Strategy: Rami Dudin
Sr Strategist: Sydney Hill
Creative Director: Steve Ierullo
Creative Director: Hemal Dhanjee
Executive Creative Director: Chris Booth
Group Account Director: Alex Karayannides
Account Director: Kyron Sobers
Account Supervisor: Nick Lepp
Account Executive: Zoe Fetsis
Producer: Rachel D’Ercole, Sarah Moen
Sr. Integrated Producer: Raquel Mullen
Sr. Production Designer: Jeannette Downes
Talent + Traffic Manager: Christine Baggs
PR Director: Natalia Banoub

Client
KFC
Chief Marketing Officer: Katherine Bond Debecki
Director, Marketing: Azim Akhtar
Senior Manager, Media & Regional Marketing: Lauren Pottie
Marketing Manager, Brand & Partnerships: Jordan Sequeira
Associate Marketing Manager: Olha Safonik

Production
Photographer / Videographer: Ben Dartnell
Assistant:
Retoucher: Allan Davey
Talent: Robert Wills (The Colonel)
Hair & Makeup: Pina Robinson
Wardrobe: Laura Deluca

PR Agency
Narrative
Managing Director - Cathy Mitchell
Executive Creative Director - Debbie Chan
Vice President - Lauren Baswick
Account Director - Katie Mills
Senior Account Manager - Holly Wilks

Media
UM Canada
Vice President - Derek Ouellette - VP
Manager - Adam Steeves Adam Steeves - Manager
Senior Planner - Julia Clark