Hort Innovation is responsible for investing the banana marketing levy into a range of activities to drive awareness and consumption. Here is a quick look at what happened during the year...

The 2025/26 banana marketing strategy focused on keeping bananas top of mind as Australia’s natural energy source, while also making it easier and more compelling for shoppers to choose bananas at the point of purchase. The plan aimed to improve consumer knowledge, attitudes and purchase intent to drive volume growth, with activity split across two key pillars: communicating natural energy broadly and frequently and winning at the point of purchase.

Insights that drove our thinking

Bananas are widely bought and loved, but the opportunity is to encourage people to buy them more often, particularly light buyers. Bananas have a strong natural energy position, especially for breakfast and snacking occasions, and this provides a clear role for the campaign. Bananas compete in a much broader snacking market, where consumers are looking for nutritious, convenient, and good-value options. Retail remains the most important channel for bananas, so visibility, availability and reminders in-store and online are critical. Quality, ripeness and simply remembering to buy were also identified as important barriers to address.

What did the campaign do?

Make Your Body Sing Advertising campaign:  The campaign continued to reinforce bananas as nature’s energy source through broad-reaching media including TV, online video such as YouTube, out of home advertising panels, radio, streaming, podcasts, transit, social media and public relations. This helped keep bananas front of mind and supported the long-running natural energy positioning.  

Retail and point-of-purchase activity: Retail activity focused on reminding shoppers to buy bananas and improving conversion at the point of purchase. This included retail out-of-home, online retail activity, point-of-sale materials, as well as the Fresh Markets Australia greengrocer and market activity program. These activities were designed to improve visibility where shoppers are making purchase decisions.  

Sampling, events and education: Sampling, events and education brought the banana message to life with consumers and families. We supported National Banana Day for the second year in a row with Banana Gym Pass, and Back to School 2026 with the Banana Swim Pass Activation. Other activity included retail in-store sampling, community events, major shows and the Life Education Healthy Harold kids’ education program. These activities helped people experience bananas in relevant everyday occasions and supported the goal of building long-term purchase habits.  

What did the campaign achieve?

Paid media performance: Paid media exceeded targets across every channel, with radio and social media standing out. Retail online media delivered strong sales conversion and helped attract new-to-brand customers. Public relations generated strong media coverage, particularly around the Banana Gym Pass and Banana Swim Pass activations to support key demand focus periods.  

National Banana Day: Banana Gym Pass returned for National Banana Day on 8 October 2025 for a second year, with a larger footprint and expanded media amplification. The activation ran in more than 900 gyms, compared with 355 the previous year, and generated more than 52 million opportunities to see advertising messages.  

Back to School: To support the important back-to-school period, Banana Swim Pass evolved the proven Banana Pass platform for summer by turning a banana into a nationwide swim pass. The activation received strong media attention, supported by recently retired Olympian Ariarne Titmus as a key brand ambassador. Media delivered 52.4 million opportunities to see the banana key messages, helping connect bananas with energy and everyday movement.  

The Life Education Healthy Harold kids’ education program: 350,000 students were reached across 3,200 schools, helping build banana love with this important audience.  

2026 Sydney Royal Easter Show: Australian Bananas again were a highlight for over 800,000 showgoers sampling over 72,500 samples over the 12 days.  Showgoers enjoyed banana pieces, smoothies and yoghurt and banana spoons.