The Taste of Climate Change

Climate Basecamp, the campaigning organisation co-founded by Professor Gail Whiteman, Rainn Wilson, Steve Walls and Chuck Tatham, has launched ‘The Taste of Climate Change’, a new Easter campaign created with M+C Saatchi Group UK that uses a chocolate egg to bring the impact of climate change closer to home.

Timed to coincide with Easter, the campaign reimagines one of the season’s most familiar products to highlight how climate change is already affecting everyday foods people love, focusing on chocolate as a clear and accessible example. It forms part of Climate Basecamp’s broader ‘Save the Flavors’ narrative, which was piloted in the US by Climate Basecamp in 2023, highlighting how the foods and tastes people enjoy today are at risk as climate conditions continue to change.

The campaign is designed to raise awareness among the “moveable middle” – people who are aware of climate change but not actively engaged with it – using a tone that is accessible and engaging rather than alarmist. It aims to spark curiosity and conversation, encouraging audiences to reconsider the everyday impact of climate change and prompting light-touch actions such as sharing content and discussing the issue.

The push is inspired by the insight that many people have noticed changes in chocolate, from rising prices to shifts in size and taste, but few connect this to the impact of climate change on cocoa production.

To bring this to life, the campaign centres on a deliberately unpleasant chocolate Easter egg designed to represent the factors damaging cocoa production and the climate more widely. The egg is fully edible but intentionally tastes of petrol, acting as a representation of what’s ruining chocolate: climate change.

The idea uses humour and contrast to deliver its message, subverting expectations by turning something typically associated with enjoyment into an uncomfortable experience. Influencers and media are invited to taste the chocolate on camera, showing real-time reactions and discovering for themselves how climate change is driving chocolate’s current decline.

This approach taps into a familiar social content format, creating a highly visual, reaction-led campaign designed to work across social platforms and broadcast PR. The experience culminates in a simple message: if we don’t collectively act on climate change, we’re likely to continue to see chocolate get more expensive, smaller and less tasty, or even start to disappear completely.

The campaign is running in the UK across influencer activity and earned media, with content captured and shared over the Easter period.