UK-wide ‘Make it Lamb’ collaboration set to celebrate lamb’s versatility and naturally delicious flavour

1 September sees the start of the annual ‘Love Lamb Week’ initiative celebrating lamb’s naturally delicious flavour and versatility, encouraging the nation to try lamb in different ways. This year’s ‘Make it Lamb’ campaign is a collaboration between all four UK red meat levy boards, led by Quality Meat Scotland (QMS), with the support of the Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board (AHDB), Hybu Cig Cymru (HCC; Meat Promotion Wales) and the Livestock and Meat Commission (LMC). Activities are running UK-wide featuring the farm-to-fork story along with simple, tasty recipe content.

The campaign will include a wide range of promotions, from farm-gate banners and magazine and newspaper advertising, to retailer and butcher promotional packs and social media influencers providing recipe inspiration.

Participating levy boards and campaign collaborators such as Red Tractor, the National Farmers Union (NFU) and the National Sheep Association (NSA) will be using a distinctive campaign logo, digital assets and toolkit to ensure consistent, high impact messaging about the benefits of lamb to encourage consumers to enjoy it as part of a healthy, balanced diet. Additionally, a stakeholder pack will be shared with the wider industry, including retailers and processors, to allow for participation in the campaign through the use of digital assets across their own individual platforms.

QMS Marketing Director Emma Heath said: “We are delighted to be collaborating with the other levy boards in England, Wales and Northern Ireland to launch this new consumer-facing campaign which celebrates everything amazing about lamb. The marketing activity being undertaken by each levy board will ensure a wide-reaching national campaign during Love Lamb Week with consistent look and feel that still allows for tailored regional messaging too.”

Rob Duncan, QMS Assistant Brand Manager, added: “The campaign’s main aim is to promote the many ways that lamb can be enjoyed, ranging from simple weeknight dinners through to traditional Sunday roasts. Lamb is such a versatile and high-quality product with so many different cuts to discover – it absolutely deserves the recognition that we aim to provide with this campaign.

“The dedicated campaign branding, toolkit and digital assets included in the pack shared with industry will mean we can achieve widespread consistent messaging, gaining maximum impact across all marketing channels.”

Each levy board will be celebrating the ‘Make it Lamb’ campaign with focussed activity:

In Scotland, QMS will have a Scotch Lamb focus on its industry facing and consumer facing (Make it Scotch) social media channels, and will be working with social media influencers to promote Scotch Lamb and the ‘Make it Lamb’ campaign. The Make it Scotch website will have a lamb focus for the week, bolstered by consumer PR across a wide and varied range of press and digital media.

In England, AHDB will feature half a million ‘Make it Lamb’ stickers on British lamb packs across five major retailers. It will run social media advertisements on the @SimplyBeefandLamb Instagram and Facebook channels featuring well-known foodie influencers. Advertisements will also appear in national print press. Promotional kits containing recipe leaflets, sticker sheets, posters and children’s activity sheets will be mailed to about 1,500 subscribed butchers and farm shops. Free marketing resources can also be ordered from the AHDB website (while stocks last).

The National Farmers Union (NFU) will be supporting the campaign with sheep farmers from the iconic upland areas and rolling English lowlands highlighting the importance sheep play in shaping the nation’s landscape.

In Wales, Hybu Cig Cymru – Meat Promotion Wales (HCC) will run a digital advertising campaign, including promotions on ITV Wales and S4C, a PR consumer campaign about lamb’s versatility working with diverse media outlets, and engaging with parent influencers to showcase the versatility of Welsh Lamb on its social media channels including Instagram @pgiwelshlamb . A strong focus will also be placed on how it plays an important nutritional part in children’s diets, providing inspiration for back-to-school meals. In addition, details will also be shared through HCC’s dedicated education newsletter.

In Northern Ireland, Livestock & Meat Commission (LMC) will be launching its schools programme with a focus on lamb, as well as working with influencers on social media and developing accompanying radio activity. The Commission will also be hosting retailer sampling events in collaboration with industry stakeholders which will facilitate conversation with consumers and provide insight to the farm-to-fork supply chain of Farm Quality Assured lamb. In addition, LMC will also commission consumer research on the lamb sector.

A range of recipes showcasing lamb and its versatility will be featured during the week, including lamb madras tostadas, mini air fryer lamb hotpots with fresh mint sauce, Scotch Lamb tacos with zaatar and baba-ghanoush and Scotch Lamb skewers with coriander pesto.

Emma Heath added: “We are all looking forward to this celebration of lamb across the UK at the beginning of September, and seeing the results of this collaborative, distinctive and positive ‘Make it Lamb’ campaign.”