Cadbury 5 Star calls a truce with Valentine’s Day : By “Sponsoring” 1 Million dates

Years of poking fun at the drama around Valentine’s Day, Cadbury 5 Star is changing course at least on the surface. The brand, known for its long-running “Eat 5 Star. Do Nothing” positioning, has announced it is “ending the war” against Valentine’s Day and attempting to “restore” the occasion.

In previous years, 5 Star built a reputation for undercutting the hype around February 14. Last year’s “Destroy Valentines Day” campaign even encouraged so-called “uncles” to hijack the celebration and dilute the romance. But this February, the brand surprised audiences with a teaser on its YouTube channel claiming it would bring Valentine’s Day back to the way it was meant to be celebrated  by spending its marketing budget on sponsoring 1 million dates.

That announcement was followed by a reveal film that took the idea further. According to the campaign narrative, the brand brought together experts to research the origins of Valentine’s Day and create what it calls the “ideal” Valentine’s Day itinerary supposedly designed the way the creator of the day might have planned it. The plan involved sponsoring 1 million of these research-backed Valentine’s Day packages, with the stated aim of restoring the day to its “pure and original” form.But the research, as the campaign reveals, led to an unexpected twist.

With that turn, Cadbury 5 Star circles back to its core philosophy, suggesting that the only way to truly honour the day of love and its creator  is to spend it doing nothing.

Nitin Saini, Vice President - Marketing, Mondelez India, said, “Cadbury 5 Star has always approached Valentine’s Day with playful mischief, and this year we wanted to evolve that narrative in a way that surprises audiences and drives engagement. By ‘ending the war’ and announcing 1 million sponsored dates only to reveal it as a classic 5 Star bluff, we created a campaign that brings consumers in on the joke while reinforcing our ‘Do Nothing’ philosophy. It’s our way of keeping Valentine’s Day fun, relaxed and unmistakably 5 Star.” The campaign has been conceived by Ogilvy.

Sukesh Kumar Nayak, Chief Creative Officer, Ogilvy India, said, “5 Star's Valentine’s Day campaign has become an annual tradition by now, with several widely popular editions that offered to save audiences from all the hype. But this year, Karunasagar Sridharan (ECD) and the Ogilvy team proposed an idea that takes the brand in a completely unexpected direction - sponsoring 1 million dates in order to 'restore' the day to its original form. But there's a twist - a surprising truth bomb that might just change the way we look at Valentine’s Day forever. Yet again, the brand has pulled off an unconventional stunt that only 5 Star can get away with. The campaign is supported by a web platform put together by our Creative Tech team where couples can sign up for the free dates."

The media strategy also plays into the larger idea. Shekhar, President, Client Solutions, South Asia, Wavemaker added, “This year, Cadbury 5Star takes its iconic ‘Do Nothing’ manifesto from philosophy to provocation. We introduce Esther Howland as a never-before-seen celebrity endorser not to celebrate romance, but to interrupt it. By reimagining this historical figure across modern cultural touchpoints, we position her as a ‘circuit breaker’ in the romance economy. From endless digital scrolls to real-world dating hotspots, our media intervention disrupts predictable Valentine narratives, nudging Gen Z to opt out, slow down, and unapologetically ‘Do Nothing.’”

Instead of straightforwardly celebrating romance, the campaign leans into misdirection  promising grand romantic gestures, only to land back on the brand’s familiar message: skip the pressure, skip the plans, and do nothing.