Emotive and YoPro Handed Out 45,000 Yogurts, Found Reason People Run Marathons

On Sunday, August 31st, Sydney hosted Australia’s first-ever marathon major and largest-ever running event, the 2025 TCS Sydney Marathon presented by ASICS, attended by 50,000 runners from more than 100 countries.

In the lead-up to the race, official event partner YoPro and Emotive teamed up with renowned endurance athlete Turia Pitt to launch 'Every Runner Has a Reason', a campaign celebrating the personal motivations that get people lacing up for marathons. 

LBB caught up with Turia, Emotive CEO Simon Joyce and head of earned creative Jessica Cluff, and Danone head of marketing Xavier Gonzalez following the race. 

LBB> This is the latest in a long line of work for YoPro and Emotive. What has that partnership been like?

Xavier> It's been a long partnership, a long journey for our brand, and it really started as this vision based on, how do we disrupt the yogurt category in Australia?

That's been really interesting about our journey and our work with Emotive. We've gone from a platform about fueling your journey to now, where we are today, which is about feeding your progress. Part of that was a recognition that progress is probably a more relatable thing for most people, a journey is very heroic and a lot of people aren't going through those heroic moments all the time. For us to really continue to grow our brand, one of the key things we identified was we need to continue to resonate and be relevant with consumers.

LBB> What opportunity did the spectacle of the marathon present?

Xavier> It gave us an opportunity to really push the boundaries of what we've done before with consumers.

The emotion that comes with [running a marathon] was a really interesting opportunity for us to not just dial up the functionality of a protein yogurt like we typically do, but really try and tap into the emotional side, and really try and own that emotional moment. We wanted to inspire and motivate everyone doing the run, whether it was their first run, whether it was their 20th run, whether they were young, whether they were old, whether they just wanted to prove to themselves that they can finish a marathon, whatever their motivation was. That was really this exciting opportunity to dive into a bit more meaningfulness for our brand.

LBB> When you're working around an event of this scale, on the one hand, there's already a spotlight that comes with that. The flip side of that coin is there's that much more competition for those eyeballs. How do you manage that?

Jess> The Sydney Marathon was a huge opportunity, but like you say, there are also so many brands trying to act as sponsors and non-official sponsors, trying to leverage it and activate around it. Also, everyone's talking about performance.

We knew that in order to stand out, we couldn't just talk about the functional messaging of the product – of course, that was a proof point, but we couldn't just go in with that, because we were just going to get lost. That's really why we had to find that really genuine, authentic, emotional runner’s insight. We couldn't try and speak to everyone, we had to just speak to the runners.

LBB> Turia, what drew you to this campaign?

Turia> I’m hugely passionate about helping people become fitter, happier and more confident through running. As a lifelong runner and former ultramarathon runner, it’s just amazing to see the explosion in interest in endurance running at the moment – including sell-out marathons and half events across the country. 

What I find really interesting is that most marathon runners aren’t chasing a podium – they’re running for a reason. YoPro’s campaign beautifully celebrates the huge range of motivators and rationales that drive marathon runners – from personal milestones to supporting a cause, building mental strength, and overcoming life’s challenges, the drivers that keep runners going when body and mind start to tire. 

And as the weeks of training wear on, remembering that reason is as important as the right fuel. 

LBB> From the brand’s side, why was Turia the right choice?

Jess> One of the key things that we mined out of this brief was that there's no one type of athlete, there's no one type of marathon runner. There's thousands of people who are there with their own very unique reason. That's really where Turia came in. Her whole purpose is to inspire people to run – it's not about how fast you are or how good you are, how elite you are. It's just about putting one foot in front of the other and just starting moving.

Simon> She brings an incredibly engaged audience with her, and now more than ever, that’s the shortcut to attention. If you get that synchronicity between the brand, the talent, and the audience – and there's so much going on there, especially in our social feeds – it is a lovely shortcut when you get it right to grab people. And of course, what she stands for and what we stand for as a brand, that connection made it even more powerful.

LBB> The ad is an emotional take on what it’s like to train for a marathon. So, what’s it really like?

Turia> It’s emotional. And hard on your body and mind. And exhausting. And amazing. Ultimately, crossing that finishing line makes all those hours and hours of training worth it.

It was kind of fitting that the YoPro campaign was shot in the rain. There’s no excuses when you’re training for a marathon – it’s rail, hail or shine – and it’s that commitment, that endurance, no matter the circumstances, that unites all marathon runners.

LBB> For all the joy of crossing the finish line, how did you also reflect that it really is a lot of hard work?

Jess> We knew that we had to tap into that emotional hook of drilling down into people's purpose and reminding them why they signed up for this thing in the first place.

We only came into market very tactically and deliberately four weeks out, because we knew that was the point in people's training journeys that they were tired and they probably wanted to give up. Something like one in three give up at around that point due to either injury or just mental fatigue. So we thought, really strategically, this is the time where we can come in and remind all of these first-time runners in particular, but all runners really, of why they're doing this crazy thing.

LBB> This campaign really leaned into running influencers as well, tell me about that?

Jess> For the reach, but also the attention. To Simon's point, it's very easy to switch from a post coming from YoPro – sorry, Xavier! People are actively ignoring posts from brands, but if you're seeing someone you love, you respect, you admire, and you follow talking to you and seeing YoPro as part of their training journey … it's a really strong tactic.

Simon> What we're seeing is the audience is a little bit more sceptical around campaign moments with influencers, and what YoPro and Always Human has done so well, year after year, they've had these long term partnerships with a squad of talent. The relationship becomes closer and more trusted, and when someone consistently shows up with the same brand, with a similar brand idea, that's when you get that compounding return. 

YoPro did that before anyone else, I’d argue, saying, ‘We're going to have a constant, always-on drum beat for this brand through a whole squad of talent that are living and breathing the performance and lifestyle we're after’. That’s become a lot more common in our briefs.

LBB> What has the response been like so far?

Xavier> It’s very early for any flow on sales data or key brand tracking metrics, but we handed out 45,000 samples of yogurt. So feedback from that has been very positive. We obviously track a few things online where we can, and it's been a really positive build up to the campaign through that #FeedYourProgress hashtag that we were promoting. So again, there's been really nice engagement leading up, during, and post-event.