Nestlé has earmarked £16m in marketing spend for KitKat next year - the most expensive confectionery campaign in history, it claims.

About £6m of the year’s budget will support KitKat’s new Perfect Break competition, which kicks off in January. Graham Walker, Nestlé UK’s trade communications manager, claimed the continuous stream of advertising that is scheduled throughout 2009 would reach 99.9% of the brand’s target audience of young professionals.

“It’s going to be pretty impossible to ignore KitKat next year,” said Walker. “Each of our target consumers will see the TV adverts 53 times, the ads will be on TV for 10 of the 12 months and the £16m spend is unprecedented in confectionery. The sheer size of our media investment will be a huge revenue generator.”

The on pack Perfect Break competition offers consumers the chance to win £1m worth of prizes and Nestlé claims entrants have a one in 10 chance of winning - odds that Walker believed other competitions would fail to match.

“We know times are hard but we don’t want people to worry about taking time off work to have a break,” said Walker. “KitKat champions having a break - and it is more important than ever to do so with people feeling under pressure to work so hard.”

Walker also revealed that Nestlé spent £2m more than this year’s planned £9m media spend for KitKat Senses after sales exceeded expectations. Since launching in January, the low-calorie chocolate has reached £14m in sales.

New ‘Goodwill to all Women’ ads will feature on TV and billboards from this week.

Topics