Chiquita Brands' Rio Multi-Channel Media Campaign Achieves Record Results

Chiquita Brands' Rio Multi-Channel Media Campaign Achieves Record Results

Innovative strategy to promote partnership between Chiquita and the movie Rio - spearheaded by media strategy agency Gotham Direct - achieves record web engagement for Chiquita

CINCINNATI and NEW YORK, June 29, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Chiquita Brands International (NYSE: CQB), a company known for its fresh and healthy food products, and Gotham Direct, a leading media strategy agency, today announced the results of their successful multimedia campaign to promote Chiquita's partnership with the movie Rio. The campaign, which ran from March 23 (before the film was released) through May 8 (three weeks after Rio's box-office-topping opening weekend), was aimed at driving consumer engagement with a Chiquita-branded microsite - http://www.chiquita.com/rio. The microsite promoted Rio and Chiquita through interactive games and activities, entertaining videos, healthy recipes, and a sweepstakes.

Working closely with Chiquita, Gotham Direct created a multichannel media strategy that leveraged the Chiquita-Rio partnership via rich media banner units, cross-channel promotions, playful on-air radio endorsements, broadcast and cable tv ads, and eye-catching print and in-theater ads - all designed to drive traffic to and engage with the Chiquita-Rio microsite. To reach the target audience - parents and their children - Gotham Direct targeted leading online parenting sites, such as Disney and Kaboose, high-profile video sites such as Hulu and YouTube, popular social media venues , PPC search, and specific television, radio, and cinema markets based on forecasted impact. In addition, special Rio-themed stickers on Chiquita bananas were created and placed on millions of bananas to further generate awareness.

Within two weeks of the media campaign's launch, targeted traffic and engagement levels on the Chiquita.com website jumped: Traffic was more than 15 times what the site had experienced during that same period the prior year - or the amount of traffic the site received for the entire six months prior to the Rio campaign. Moreover, within just six-week's time the media campaign had generated over 400 million impressions and over half a million unique visits to the microsite, vastly exceeding expectations.

"This is a true success story, about how an established brand such as Chiquita can successfully create a full-on integrated branded partnership with a movie - Rio - and create a highly successful media campaign to promote that partnership," stated Shattuck Groome, partner, Gotham Direct. "Working closely with Chiquita, Gotham Direct developed a customized, geo-targeted integrated media strategy to promote the Chiquita-Rio microsite and partnership that tracked and optimized a variety of KPIs (key performance indicators). We optimized the campaign by continually adjusting our media and creative strategy, removing investments away from under-performing media / creative assets and re-investing towards tactics that provided greatest return on investment.

"To promote Chiquita's partnership and tie-in with the movie Rio, we wanted a smart yet engaging media campaign around the Chiquita Rio website that could provide trackable, measurable results for our brand," explained Craig Stephen, Vice President North American Bananas and Fresh Select. "That's exactly what we got from Gotham Direct. Their multimedia approach - targeting leading parenting and video sites, Facebook, and Google, as well as select TV, radio, print, and in-theater markets - resulted in increased web traffic for Chiquita as well as increased brand awareness and sales."

About Chiquita Brands International, Inc.

Chiquita Brands International, Inc. (NYSE: CQB) is a leading international marketer and distributor of high-quality fresh and value-added food products--from energy-rich bananas and other fruits to nutritious blends of convenient green salads. The company markets its healthy, fresh products under the Chiquita® and Fresh Express® premium brands and other related trademarks. With annual revenue of more than $3 billion, Chiquita employs more than 21,000 people and has operations in nearly 70 countries worldwide. For more information, please visit www.chiquitabrands.com.

About Gotham Direct

Gotham Direct, founded in 2002, is a privately held strategic media planning, buying and analytics agency with offices in New York and London. Using a variety of online and offline media tactics, such as paid search and television ads, as well as proprietary planning systems and measuring processes, the agency enables advertisers to maximize their return on marketing investment. The agency works with businesses and brands operating in a wide range of categories and industries. Clients include 1800 Tequila, Hotwire.com, Chiquita, JPMorgan Chase, Gore-Tex and New York University. Gotham Direct has been recognized as one of the fastest growing companies in the U.S. by Inc. magazine, Entrepreneur magazine and PriceWaterhouse Coopers. For more information, please visit www.GothamDirectInc.com.

SOURCE Gotham Direct

Gotham Direct

CONTACT: Belinda Rooney of SS|PR, +1-609-750-9110, brooney@sspr.com, for Gotham Direct

Web Site: http://www.chiquitabrands.com

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