Prime Bites

Taking a viral protein brownie mainstream

Consumer Research & Campaign Strategy · Fall 2025

Team lead, four-person team · Presented to the Prime Bites founding team

A Prime Bites protein brownie with purple frosting. Presented to founders Honorable mention

01 — Overview

The brief, and the audience we chose

Prime Bites built a top-selling TikTok Shop business on dessert-flavored protein snacks and a core audience of women 25–45. The brand set a challenge: reach a new audience without losing that community, with $500,000 and ninety days. We took millennial men — the expansion audience rather than the one closest to the existing brand — and built the campaign from primary research.

interviews
20
survey responses
101
day campaign
90
to founders
Presented

02 — Scope

What was set, and what I owned

The brief

Take Prime Bites from cult favorite to mainstream with a 360° strategy. $500,000, 90 days, one target audience of two offered.

budget
$500,000
to run it
90 days
audiences offered
1 of 2
Client
Prime Bites — protein snack brand
Engagement
Consumer behavior challenge set directly by the brand, run through Florida Atlantic University
Audience chosen
Millennial men, 25–44
Role
Team lead — four-person team
Owned personally
Survey instrument, the research section of the final report, and running the team
Outcome
Presented to the Prime Bites founding team. Honorable mention.

03 — Method

Three stages, each one narrowing the question

  1. 01

    Secondary research

    Category, competitive set, and NFL audience behavior. Established that millennial men treat NFL viewing as a weekly ritual and that the category's growth is in convenience-led occasions.

  2. 02

    Twenty in-depth interviews

    One-on-one, five questions, structured to surface purchase drivers rather than preferences. What matters most when buying a snack · when a protein brownie fits into a day · which healthy brands they buy and why · how they define healthy versus convenient and which wins · how they discover new snacks.

    Interviews were chosen over focus groups deliberately — group settings soften individual answers.

  3. 03

    Survey — 16 questions, 101 responses

    Screened to millennial men 25–44 who use social media and follow the NFL.

    1. Intro
    2. Screening
    3. Behavior
    4. Concept test
    5. Demographics

    The campaign concept was described inside the survey, twice, so later questions could test reactions to a specific proposition rather than an abstract one. The instrument tested the actual idea, not just the category.

The instrument all 16 questions, their type, and what each was for
#QuestionTypeWhat it was for
1How often do you eat snacks such as protein brownies, bars, or shakes?Single selectBehavior
2When do you typically eat a protein snack?Multi selectBehavior
3Have you heard of PrimeBites Protein Brownies before this survey?Single selectAwareness
4Where do you usually find or hear about new snack brands?Select top 2Behavior · Finding 03
5How often do you watch NFL games during the season?Single selectScreening
6Which of the following best describes your game-day food mindset?Select up to twoBehavior
7When choosing a snack to watch your football team play, which factor is most important to you?Single selectBehavior · Finding 04
8What would most motivate you to try PrimeBites for the first time?Select top 2Behavior · Finding 01
9How appealing is this “Game Day” campaign idea sound to you?5-point scaleConcept test
10How likely would you be to follow or engage with a food-related challenge promoted by an NFL player on TikTok or Instagram?Single selectConcept test · Finding 02
11Which type of influencer would make you most interested in the 3-month “Game Day” campaign?Single selectConcept test · Finding 02
12How important is a brand’s commitment to sustainability and environmentally friendly practices when you choose a snack?5-point scaleBehavior
13What is your age?Single selectDemographics
14Where do you currently live? (City & State)Open textDemographics
15Which of the following best describes your lifestyle?Single selectDemographics
16Are you currently working, in school, or both?Single selectDemographics

04 — The audience

Who the campaign is actually for

Jake

Sales rep · South Florida

Mindset
Work hard, play hard. Not on a strict diet, but wants to know he's fueling well. Motivated by convenience, taste, and staying in shape.
Buying
Buys wherever's easiest — 7-Eleven, grocery, online restocks. Reads labels without obsessing. Ties to sport or game day get his attention.
Media
Instagram, YouTube, TikTok. Follows NFL teams and fantasy pages. Short, high-energy video. Podcasts on commutes.
Tension
Wants snacks that are both healthy and satisfying — most taste bland or read as diet food. Responds to fuel, protein, and game-day energy.

Built from the twenty interviews — a persona derived from primary research is a different object from one invented in a workshop.

05 — Findings

What the research actually said

Product buys trial. Celebrity doesn't.

68Free sample or in-store tasting
9NFL athlete endorsement
What would most motivate first trial, top 2101 respondents
  1. Free sample or in-store tasting68
  2. Nutrition claims39
  3. Discount code38
  4. Positive social reviews29
  5. NFL athlete endorsement9

The clearest result in the study, and it pointed the budget at sampling rather than talent.

Star power buys attention, not participation.

Which influencer would most interest you in the campaign (Q11)87 respondents
  1. Current NFL player45
  2. Everyday fan / relatable personality17
  3. Retired NFL legend / analyst14
  4. NFL social media influencer11
Likelihood of engaging with that content (Q10)95 respondents
  1. Somewhat likely31
  2. Neither likely nor unlikely27
  3. Somewhat unlikely16
  4. Extremely unlikely13
  5. Extremely likely8

Asked which influencer would most interest them in the campaign, 45 of 87 chose a current NFL player — comfortably the top answer (Q11, n = 87).

Asked how likely they'd be to actually engage with that content, responses landed mostly in the undecided middle: 31 somewhat likely, 27 neutral, 8 extremely likely, against 29 unlikely (Q10, n = 95).

Interest and participation are different questions, and only one of them was strong.

Discovery is social and word of mouth — but the shelf still matters.

The shelf still matters

In-store wasn't an option in the survey. The interviews raised it unprompted — participants repeatedly described finding snacks by browsing and making snap decisions at the shelf.

Where you usually find or hear about new snack brands, top 2105 respondents
  1. Social media66
  2. Word of mouth / friends61
  3. Online ads36
  4. Other12
  5. YouTube10
  6. Reviews9
  7. Podcasts7
  8. None of the above4

That's why retail activation sits alongside the social plan.

The category tension.

6

of 102 picked sweet

as the most important factor in a game-day snack

Most important factor in a game-day snack102 respondents
  1. Savory39
  2. Convenience35
  3. Health8
  4. None7
  5. Price6
  6. Sweet6
  7. Texture1

Sweet finished near the bottom. Prime Bites is a dessert brand. The research that justified the football timing also established that this audience isn't reaching for sweet during a game.

06 — The campaign

GameDay

GameDay — a 90-day campaign running the final stretch of the NFL season.

  1. 02

    Retail takeover

    Concept mockup: a turf-wrapped Prime Bites end cap in a store, with goal post standees and football-field floor decals.
    Concept visualization. Not produced work.

    End caps wrapped in turf, "Game Day Huddle Zones" with football-field floor decals and goal post standees, shelf talkers, and displays reflecting local team colors, in Target, Costco and 7-Eleven.

    Answers the interview finding in 03.

  2. 01

    Sampling and pop-up activations

    Concept mockup: a Prime Bites GameDay tailgate booth in a stadium parking lot.
    Concept visualization. Not produced work.

    Tailgate-style booths at stadium lots, campus tailgates and sports bars. Free product, push-up and plank challenges with prizes, hype team, #PrimeBitesGameDay activation.

    Answers Finding 01.

  3. 03

    Co-branded partnership

    Concept mockup: a Prime Bites and Halo Top co-branded sampling stand.
    Concept visualization. Not produced work.

    A pairing with Halo Top around warming the brownie and topping it. Branded sampling stands in the ice cream aisle, flavor pairings voted on socially.

  4. 04

    Influencer-led social

    Partnership with a sports content creator with 3M+ followers across YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. Positioned as supporting reach, not driving trial — Finding 02 is why.

  5. 05

    Cross-platform content series

    Episodic short-form across TikTok, Reels and Shorts: game-day snacking, recipes, athlete and creator cameos.

Budget

$127,000 to $255,000costed
vs
$500,000available

Costed as a range rather than a number, with headroom inside the brief's budget to scale influencer tier, post volume and number of activations once early performance came in.

Measurement: engagement and hashtag tracking, website traffic and promo-code redemption, in-store sales lift at activated locations versus control stores, restock frequency, and pre/post brand-recall polling.

07 — Notes

I'd choose a different idea.

The football angle is defensible. 72% of the sample watches the NFL weekly, the season gave us a natural 90-day window, and the concept tested moderately appealing or better with half the room. Every piece of it is supported.

It's also the safe answer, and our own data said so. Asked what matters in a game-day snack, this audience put savory first and sweet near the bottom. We were recommending a dessert brand into an occasion where the audience doesn't want dessert, and we bridged that with sampling and activation rather than resolving it.

The research was sound. The idea it was pointed at was conventional. Given the brief again, I'd spend more of the exploration budget on occasions the category hasn't already colonized, and treat a well-supported obvious answer as a starting point rather than a destination.