Hershey’s taps Katseye and “Pinky Up” to make small indulgence feel cultural
Hershey’s pairs Creme Bars with Katseye and a “Pinky Up” gesture, aiming for repeatable, UGC-friendly indulgence across TV, social, and OOH.
If you have ever watched a trend turn into a gesture, then into a “you had to be there” moment, you already get why “Pinky Up” is doing the heavy lifting here. Gen Z does not just buy a snack. They buy the feeling of being in on the bit, especially when the vibe is playful, a little chaotic, and easy to copy in public.
The Hershey Company is leaning into that behaviour with a campaign tied to its new Hershey’s Creme Bars (salted caramel and affogato flavours) and a partnership with girl group Katseye. The company also framed the products around “accessible premium,” positioning the bars as a small luxury at a small price, particularly in a period of low consumer confidence. The details were outlined in the company’s newsroom post.
Table of contents
Jump to each section:
- Why “Pinky Up” works as a Gen Z candy signal
- How the subway spot turns a bar into a moment you can copy
- The media plan is built for pacing, not a one-week spike
- What this means for marketers
Why “Pinky Up” works as a Gen Z candy signal
The campaign is built around a simple truth: “treat yourself” is not only about taste. It is about permission. Hershey’s senior brand manager Katrina Vatter described a “huge trend” in accessible premium: people want a small indulgence that feels worth it, without a status-signalling price tag.
Katseye gives that idea a cultural wrapper. Their “Wild” EP debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in August, and the campaign uses their song “Pinky Up,” which plays with a tongue-in-cheek “acting classy” energy. That is a useful bridge for a mainstream candy brand trying to feel “in culture” without acting like it is trying too hard.
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How the subway spot turns a bar into a moment you can copy
The centrepiece is a 60-second ad set on a moving subway train. Once a Katseye member bites into the bar, “Pinky Up” starts, and choreography spreads through the train, including a hand motion inspired by the title. It is the kind of creative choice that translates cleanly into short-form video language, because it is not just a narrative, it is a repeatable action.
Hershey’s also translated the subway scene into out-of-home murals designed to invite people to do their own “Pinky Up” gesture, which is essentially a built-in prompt for user-generated content. The brand’s team also captured “a ton” of assets during filming to pace out across brand and partner handles, rather than recycling the same edit for the entire run.
The media plan is built for pacing, not a one-week spike
Hershey’s described the video as the “spark” rather than the whole plan, with distribution spanning national TV, connected TV, digital video, display, earned media, influencer, out-of-home, paid social, and streaming audio. The campaign also includes sampling and pop-up experiences in the fall, plus a partnership with Uber around select cultural moments.
Notably, the Katseye partnership is not framed as a one-off: it continues through next year, and an in-person appearance is in the works. That matters because fandom-led marketing usually works better when it feels like a relationship, not a single branded interruption.
This also sits inside a larger investment posture. The Hershey Company reported organic net sales growth of 3.6% in Q2 2026 and said it expects a 30% year-over-year increase in brand investment to support growth in 2026 and 2027, including a 30% increase in new innovation items like the Creme Bars versus the first half, per comments from CEO Kirk Tanner on an earnings call.
What this means for marketers
The cultural unlock here is not “celebrity endorsement.” It is the creation of a behaviour people can borrow.
- Treat the gesture as the product, not the add-on
“Pinky Up” works because it is a simple physical cue that can leave the TV spot and live on phones, in murals, and in group chats. The bar becomes a prop in a social moment. - Build for “not cringey” by starting with real cultural fit
Hershey’s team found the hook after seeing Katseye perform “Pinky Up” at Coachella. The point is not that Coachella is magical. It is that the brand started from a naturally existing vibe and then built creative around it. - Pace creative like a feed, not like a flight
The decision to capture lots of assets and release them over time reflects how audiences actually experience campaigns now: in fragments, in repeats, and in different formats depending on platform mood. - Make “accessible premium” feel emotional, not economic
In a low-confidence environment, “small luxury” messaging lands better when it feels like self-permission and comfort, not price justification. Hershey’s framing focuses on “worth it” indulgence, not status. - Use OOH as a participation surface, not a billboard
Murals that invite a gesture are closer to “public stage” than “static media.” The more the OOH creative resembles something you can do, the more it can feed back into social content loops.
Stepping back, this campaign reflects a broader shift in how Gen Z experiences brands: people want snacks to be part of their day, their jokes, and their identity moments, not just their pantry. When a product can be attached to a recognisable action and a soundtrack, it starts to behave more like culture than advertising.
For marketers, the lesson is to stop treating the 60-second film as the finished object. The finished object is the set of moments people can recreate, remix, and carry into their own feeds, especially when the brand’s role is to make the indulgence feel like a little shared ritual rather than a hard sell.
