Bagel brand, New York Bakery Co, is launching a marketing campaign with the UK’s new star of health and fitness, Joe Wicks, aka The Body Coach.

The campaign includes TV and press advertising as well as shopper marketing.

The TV campaign, ‘A Taste of New York’, is on air now and will run until mid-February. The creative is designed to capture the spirit of New York, showcasing the exciting, vibrant atmosphere of the city, which is known as the home of bagels. The advert also aims to cement the brand’s positioning as the ‘bringing a bite of NYC to the UK’.

The link up with Joe Wicks taps into the established hashtag #buildupbagel. The Build Up Bagel campaign will play out through PR and digital channels, appealing to the mainstream audience as well as the millions of  fans who already follow Joe online, who are looking for healthy and tasty ideas to kick start their new year.

The brand’s head of marketing Karen Revel-Chion said: “The campaign marks the start of a huge year for New York Bakery. We have increased our marketing investment behind the brand this year, and our ambition is to grow sales substantially.

“Our New Year campaign will inspire consumers to view bagels as a tasty everyday addition to a healthy balanced diet. We’re delighted to be working with Joe, his fame is rising rapidly and he is already a huge bagel fan. He will help us to demonstrate how versatile New York Bakery bagels can be and that carbs are the fuel in our diets.”

Joe Wicks, who goes by the alias ‘The Body Coach’, recently launched his first book Lean in 15. His health and fitness mantra is to ‘rescue you from depressing low-calorie diets once and for all by teaching people how to fuel their body with the right food at the right time.’

Fast off the heels of its New Year campaign, New York Bakery Co has plans to roll out a raft of new products and a significant brand investment in marketing both above and below-the-line.