Multiple “Jesus” sightings (in inanimate objects) had occurred in rapid succession in the Netherlands with growing coverage in the news.
To capitalize on this buzz, on the Friday before Easter, Nestle’s agency in Amsterdam (UbachsWisbrun/JWT) seeded fake news content (with pictures) to the country’s largest news websites.
The story identified that a Dutchman had found the image of none other then Jesus Christ in his Kit-Kat bar. Kit Kat wanted to play on its 'Have a break, have a Kit Kat' tagline within this context. Have a break in the Netherlands means "give me a break" or "enough is enough". Instead of creating an ad, they created a sighting of Jesus in a Kit Kat.
A credible fake email was created and sent from a person who had apparently just taken a bite out a Kit Kat and found, to his utter disbelief, an image of Jesus. Within four days the Jesus Kit-Kat was on more then 100,000 websites around the world.
Watch the Case Study
