The encyclopedia · Strategy & Leadership · Strategic decision · 2025–2026
Puck turned Lebanese mothers' recipes into licensed dishes, making them income, not aid
After war cut retail in Lebanon, Arla's Puck licensed family recipes to restaurants, sharing revenue with recipe authors.
Arla Foods (Puck) · FP7 McCann
The solution
When war upended Arla's retail distribution in Lebanon, the Puck brand's usual route to market — supermarket shelves — vanished. The conventional relief response would have been a corporate donation. Instead FP7 McCann built Recipe for Change: a Ramadan campaign that treats the family recipes of Lebanese mothers as the campaign's core asset and makes the women contributors, not recipients.
The campaign licensed the women's recipes to 96 participating restaurants across 28 cities, each putting the dishes on their menus. Half of the revenue from every dish sold is routed to the woman who supplied the recipe, so her cultural knowledge becomes a contracted, recurring income rather than a one-time gift.
The commercial framing was the point: juror Anny Havercroft of TikTok noted the work 'starts with something deeply human' and uses it to create real economic value; AKQA's Tara McKenty called it a 'genuinely elegant piece of strategic thinking, finding dignity-preserving value in something people already own' instead of positioning recipients of charity.
The program's ask has since pulled more than 350 inquiries from restaurants in Europe, North America, Asia and Oceania, and the partners are building a digital platform to expand the model. It took the Grand Prix of the Year (Positive Impact Group) at MAD STARS 2026.
Why it worked
- Recipes are authentic, scarce and owned by the women themselves — the one asset aid money could never buy, which makes the exchange a partnership rather than a handout.
- Licensing ties the payment to orders, so the income renews with every plate sold instead of ending when the donation budget closes.
- Restaurants got a genuinely differentiating menu with a real story, which is why 96 signed on across 28 cities on a humanitarian timeline.
- The 'half the revenue to the cook' rule is legible to everyone at the table — customer, chef, contributor — which keeps the model honest without a complex legal agreement.
What can be applied
When charity is obvious, try commerce: if beneficiaries supply IP, goodwill pays dividends, and restaurants get unique stories.
Aftermath
The campaign ran through Ramadan 2025 and then scaled off the back of the award circuit: over 350 restaurant inquiries from four continents followed, and a digital platform to formalize more recipe licensing is in development. It won the Grand Prix of the Year (Positive Impact) at MAD STARS 2026 in Busan and was shortlisted at Cannes Lions 2026, making the recipe-as-IP model one of the most cited examples of dignity-first brand relief work.
Sources
- TBWA\Hakuhodo, FP7 McCann lead MAD STARS 2026 with Grand Prix of the Year wins with 'Radio Time Machine', 'Recipe for Change'
- The Power of Family Recipes to Help Lebanese Mothers Reclaim Their Futures
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