Tiger Brands’ Eat Well Live Well campaign gets South Africans excited about healthier eating and living

Adding a dash of humour to table talk on healthier eating and living seems to be the recipe for encouraging South Africans to take better care of their health and well-being.

The combination of well-known local comedian, Trevor Gumbi and a 28 day health challenge proved a successful formula in getting more South Africans excited and interested in making better food choices and having a healthier lifestyle overall.

In fact, more than two million people engaged with Tiger Brands’ Eat Well Live Well “28 Days” campaign aimed at encouraging people to change their eating habits for better health. Gumbi, better known as the campaign’s health “guru” aka Gurumbi, used his talent as an entertainer to get people reaching for their greens amongst other healthy foods.

‘South Africans are not getting any healthier and are easily fatigued by talk of healthy eating and living. Eat Well Live Well – our health and nutrition programme – takes the guesswork and labour out of changing eating habits so that better food choices become part of the day-to-day of more South Africans lives,’ says Tracey Rowles, Corporate Strategy Manager at Tiger Brands.

She continues, ‘Adding humour to a topic like healthy eating and living, which is often viewed as tedious, can help increase motivation levels and retention of information. Gurumbi proved to be the winner.’

But why just 28 days to a healthier living?

It may be just a myth, but many believe that it takes 21 days to break a bad habit and a further 7 days to entrench good habits, so Eat Well Live Well decided to give it a go in a campaign created by local digital marketing agency, HelloSquare.

‘The reality is that it isn’t always easy for someone to consciously eat healthier. Our busy lifestyles and the rising cost of living, as well as other challenges we are faced with as a society, can make it difficult to make a concerted effort to change bad eating habits. People can be highly motivated by a challenge. It keeps them focused on the end-goal while encouraging them to see it through and to succeed,’ says Rowles.

The 28 day challenge drew on Trevor’s personal wellness journey to encourage others to stay on track with their own health goals. ‘Embarking on a wellness routine is often a hard and lonely road, however, this time, it was made much easier by aligning with the team from Eat Well Live Well. Every step of the way, I learnt new ways of achieving new gains and helpful tricks to not overeat. The best being to have conversations with imaginary people between mouthfuls, ‘cause now when people catch me talking to myself, I always say “Gurumbi” told me to,’ says Trevor.

Over the 28 days, Gurumbi shared tips and inspiration to help people navigate their new wellness journey, while motivating Mzansi to break bad habits and form new, better ones.

Some of the topics addressed by Gurumbi included replacing bad health habits such as overeating and unbalanced food plates, with better choices such as regular exercise and drinking more water.