Midwest Dairy and Freddy’s Frozen Custard and Steakburgers teamed up in 2025 for an impactful partnership. The goal was to collaborate on influencer activations, support the launch of the new National Frozen Custard Day, and promote another craveable limited-time offer (LTO), the Smoky Bacon Cheddar Stack.
“Backwards to School” Influencer Activation
To better connect with families, Midwest Dairy and Freddy’s partnered with eight influencers who created 16 pieces of content across TikTok and Instagram. For a sample of content, check out @wichitamoms and @the.walkerfam on Instagram and @veeefranklin on TikTok! This promotion ran from August 15 to September 2.
The content focused on families of all backgrounds visiting their local Freddy’s. Influencers captured the moment when they surprised their kids by letting them enjoy frozen custard before their meal. The wholesome and excited reactions resonated strongly with moms, who showed enthusiastic support across social media. Creators did an excellent job showcasing the food, highlighting genuine reactions, and naturally bringing dairy into the conversation in an engaging way. At the end of this promotion, Freddy’s also ran a $1.99 custard cone offer in the Freddy’s app.
A total of 133 locations received targeted media support across Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma. Results included:
- 5,914,547 influencer impressions
- 22.08% engagement rate
- Offer redemption was 2.4 custard cones higher at media-targeted locations versus the rest of the system
- Resulting in 19,000 pounds of incremental milk
National Frozen Custard Day
August 8 marked National Frozen Custard Day, and Freddy’s celebrated by offering guests multiple deals. Instead of limiting the promotion to a single day, the celebration spanned the entire weekend. Guests could redeem one of three offers:
- $1 mini frost or shake
- $2 regular frost or shake
- $3 large frost or shake
The goals of the promotion were to drive app downloads, increase comparable traffic (defined as measuring the number of customer visits to a restaurant during a specific period compared to a similar time period), and grow comparable topline sales.
Midwest Dairy supported enhanced promotional efforts in 133 stores within its footprint, including Kansas, Missouri, Oklahoma, Nebraska, Iowa, and Illinois. Support began one week prior to the event to help build awareness and included:
- Over 280,000 bag stuffers
- 3.4 million paid social impressions
- 101 media articles, including Men’s Journal, MSN, and Yahoo Life
The weekend of August 8 -10 brought exceptionally hot weather, making it an ideal time for frozen custard. Notable results included:
- 18,000 loyalty app sign-ups
- 90,000 organic social media views
- 29,600 offer redemptions
- 40% increase in net sales versus 2024
- 46% increase in traffic versus 2024
- 96,000 pounds of incremental milk compared to last year
Smoky Bacon Cheddar Stack Limited Time Offer
Limited-time offers are a powerful way to bring both loyal and new customers into restaurants while allowing partners to test new concepts and create menu excitement. The Smoky Bacon Cheddar Stack fall LTO featured two steakburger patties, four slices of applewood-smoked bacon, grilled onions, and Freddy’s signature smoky fry sauce on a toasted King’s Hawaiian bun. The burger also featured not one but two slices of sharp cheddar cheese making dairy a standout ingredient in this flavor-packed burger.
The LTO was promoted through influencer marketing. Eight influencers created 15 pieces of content, including @itsepiceats and @mary.hatheway on Instagram and @wonderfully_maddy on TikTok, helping highlight the burger and dairy across Freddy’s menu, resulting in:
- 5,343,230 social media impressions
- 31.22% engagement rate
Across all dairy items on the menu, this promotion resulted in 906,000 pounds of incremental milk sold during the period from September 3 to October 31. Overall, the partnership was incredibly successful, with results totaling 1,021,000 pounds of incremental milk. Look for more work with Freddy’s in 2026!