UberEats UK’s messaging has matured over the last five years, taking it to the point where it can drop endlessly entertaining spots like its Jude Law romcom parody. System1’s Andrew Tindall tests the work and gets teary-eyed with pride.
Every so often, you watch a brand’s marketing grow up in public. Not in the clumsy sense of a rebrand, but in the subtler way brand and creative strategy evolve.
I’ve witnessed this with Uber Eats, where, as it progresses through its development cycle, wide-eyed, rational product demos slowly turn into big emotional platforms. Suddenly, agency partner Mother London’s nurturing is visible. The tiny baby we all knew is no longer in front of us.
Instead, it’s a fully … Jude Law who tugs at our heartstrings.
Let me catch you up.
The second installment of ‘When You’ve Done Enough’ launched this week, starring Jude, after Javier Bardem’s villainous version earlier this year.
This is getting dangerously close to Uber Eats sticking with the same creative idea and tagline over multiple executions and thus becoming an emotionally mature, consistent brand with a big, booming market share.
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After cracking open half a decade of System1 ad testing data, I can only assume this is why Mother took its name. Because it took a young, rational brand, held it to its marketing bosom, and raised it into an emotional category leader that any parent would be proud of. So proud, may I add, that the creatives in charge of this all just got a promotion. LOVE to see it!
Like all journeys of brand maturity, it’s a beautiful story of Mother knowing best.
‘Bring It’ was the creative idea and tagline.
Ads showed branded meals arriving quickly, often sweetened with a discount code. The agency wanted consumers to know they could order anything on Uber Eats. A very rational benefit, but as a challenger sub-brand, Uber Eats had to establish what it did first.
Examining the history of most large brands reveals that they often share a similar origin. Landing category cues and a benefit that supposedly distinguishes them. It makes sense, but the problem with rational benefits is... that anyone can copy them - and that they did.
As System1 tests every UK and US TV ad as they go live with millions of people to understand if and how they work, we can see the emotional scores were low, sitting at 1- and 2-Star Rating. They may have been informing us, but they were not resonating.
Other brands kept stealing Uber Eats lunch money, expanding their branded offerings so they could “bring it” as well. Mother knew what to do, Uber Eats was ready to learn about emotion.
‘Embrace the art of doing less’ became its creative idea for a year or so, with ‘Get Anything’ as its tagline.
It’s the brand sitting up and reaching for something broader. Instead of just showing you that you could order a Big Mac, they invited you to enjoy laziness itself.
It is a step towards emotional territory, but all brands must walk before they run. The ‘Get Anything’ rational tagline was a Mother’s loving arm still hovering for guidance as Uber Eats reaches new territory, just enough to provide confidence that this was the way forward.
The creative was literally more emotional with 3 Stars in System1 testing. Enough awards started coming in to confirm we may have a child genius on our hands, but Mother knew their job wasn’t done yet. Rocky times were ahead.
Late nights. A new category. Wine. A leap back to the rational benefit. I suspect 2023 was a testing year.
I’ve tried to understand this phase and piece together what happened. Maybe Uber Eats started hanging out in a new category (grocery) and felt it needed to start acting differently. Or maybe Uber Eats realized it had siblings around the world, and global unison was a better strategy.
‘Get anything, effortlessly’ as a creative idea and tagline does appear to throw the emotional benefit Uber Eats had discovered to the side for a bit. However, System1’s emotional Star Rating still remained at 3 Stars as “effortlessly” clung to life, doing the heavy emotional lifting.
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When brands start expanding categories, the instinct is to explain rationally again sometimes. However, I can confirm it was a phase.
As what came next would make Mother very proud…
‘When you’ve done enough, Uber Eats’ sprang on to our screens, radio, and out-of-home very early this year with Javier Bardem.
This idea captures a universal human feeling.
A platform that doesn’t need rational justifications, it needs to be a frame that celebrities like Javier Bardem and Jude Law can play with in endlessly entertaining ways. A brand that would confidently show up at its prom date’s house to declare love with flowers and a jukebox over their shoulder playing Phil Collins.
Here we have Mother London at its best.
Mothering a brand until it is confidently its best self without justification. System1 scores shot up to 4 Stars, full emotional maturity, predicting significant long-term brand growth. I’ve also just put Jude Law into testing to see how he fares. I have high hopes.
This journey matters because it reveals the hard-won effectiveness of a maturing agency-client relationship. It explains what I found in my Compound Creativity research. Those long-running creative relationships lead to more distinct and emotional advertising, and more brand and business results. Often growing into an emotional brand platform that will stand the test of time as trust, knowledge, skills, and strategy are built. It’s the holy grail of why you’d hire a creative agency.
I’m not saying this is the only way brands can start and grow.
Some don’t feel the need to spend any time explaining what they do.
Instead, The Woodsman Whisky in the UK jumping straight to emotionally charged puppet beavers is a more data-first example. Especially after it gobbled up market share almost straight away.
I’m also not saying Uber Eats definitely needed to be gently convinced from rational to emotional by Mother. Most of the world’s largest brands have started and grown like this. It’s a tried and proven brand-rearing strategy they might have agreed on.
But what’s for sure is that Mother and Uber Eats can be very proud of themselves. Few brands end up as attractive as 4-Star Javier and Jude.
The real work begins now, though.
Uber Eats and Mother can’t let the big, brutal world get in the way of their hard-won relationship. Mature brands don’t need to reinvent themselves every year. It’s now time to hold fast and enjoy their spoils together, confident in who they have become.
Andrew Tindall is a senior leader in the advertising industry and SVP of Global Partnerships at System1, where he champions creative effectiveness and evidence-based marketing. Known for his sharp thinking on out-of-home, emotional advertising, and brand growth, he’s become a go-to voice on how creativity and data can work together. With experience across major brands like Diageo and Bacardi, Andrew now helps global agencies and marketers make better ads that actually work, contributing regularly to panels, podcasts, and the occasional punchy LinkedIn rant.
UberEats
Mother