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How McDonald's Made Large Poutine a Quebec Legend
McDonald's Canada launched "Large Poutine. A Huge Legend." in Quebec in April 2021, a Cossette-produced integrated campaign using the contested origin story of poutine to introduce a large-size version of the dish across McDonald's restaurants throughout the province.
The campaign centres on a 60-second film that traces the legendary history of poutine — a dish whose disputed beginnings remain a source of genuine cultural debate across Quebec. Shot on the outskirts of Victoriaville, the film incorporates locations and figures that feature in the dish's origin narrative, including the cheesemaker in Plessisville that supplies the cheese curds for McDonald's poutine, and Jeannine Vaudreuil, who was present in Warwick in 1956 when restaurant owner Fernand Lachance is said to have first combined fries and cheese curds. That moment of alleged invention forms the storytelling backbone of the entire campaign.
Cossette accompanied the hero film with a 30-second television version and six-second and 15-second online cutdowns, with media buying handled by OMD. The campaign was published in April 2021 and planned to run through the end of May 2021, positioning spring as the season for McDonald's poutine in Canada. The new large-size offering was described as twice the size of the regular poutine, giving the product launch a clear and tangible consumer proposition. Mélissa Hains, McDonald's regional marketing director for Quebec, identified the poutine origin legend as the central storytelling device, according to Strategy. The campaign carried a Clapboard Score of 63 out of 100.
McDonald's Canada built the campaign's strategic rationale on poutine's status as a genuine Quebec cultural institution. Rather than treating the dish as a generic menu item, the brand and Cossette chose to anchor the campaign in the unresolved, widely known debate over where poutine was actually invented — a debate that continues to resonate across the province and gives the narrative an inherent local credibility.
Cédric Audet, creative director at Cossette, stated that the team's objective was to create advertising worthy of poutine's standing as a Quebec icon, according to Clapboard. That ambition shaped every creative and strategic decision, from casting to location to music. The campaign explicitly paid tribute not just to the dish but to the regions of Quebec associated with its origin — Warwick, Drummondville, and Plessisville — grounding McDonald's as a brand that understands and respects local heritage rather than simply commercialising it.
In the competitive landscape of Canadian quick-service restaurants, this kind of hyper-local cultural positioning is a meaningful differentiator. Competitors including Tim Hortons, which holds deep roots in Canadian identity, and Burger King Canada have historically competed for the same Quebec market share through promotional pricing and product variety. McDonald's choice to invest in narrative-driven, culturally specific storytelling — rather than transactional advertising — reflects a broader strategic logic: in a market where QSR brand familiarity is high, emotional and cultural resonance drives preference. McDonald's reported record global systemwide sales in 2021, according to Corporate Mcdonalds, providing the financial context for sustained investment in regionally tailored campaigns of this ambition and production scale across the Canadian market.
The creative execution for "Large Poutine. A Huge Legend." drew its visual and emotional character from an unconventional reference point. Cédric Audet noted that the team looked to film clips and epic sports videos rather than traditional advertising formats for inspiration, according to Clapboard — a decision that gives the 60-second film an energy and pace more commonly associated with cultural storytelling than with product promotion.
Director Le GED brought that sensibility to the screen, shooting on location in and around Victoriaville to capture the landscape and people of the regions tied to poutine's origin. The cast includes both actors and non-actors drawn from Warwick and Drummondville, a casting choice that adds documentary texture to the narrative and reinforces the campaign's commitment to authenticity. Including Jeannine Vaudreuil, who was present at the alleged founding moment of the dish in 1956, gives the film a rare degree of historical specificity that few food campaigns achieve.
The soundtrack was composed by Vlooper of Alaclair Ensemble, a Quebec hip-hop collective, and delivered as an original track created specifically for the campaign. This choice grounded the film in contemporary Quebec culture while honouring its historical subject matter. The production also wove in the Plessisville cheesemaker who supplies McDonald's cheese curds, connecting the supply chain to the legend in a way that reinforces product authenticity without resorting to conventional product-demonstration advertising. Together, these elements create a campaign that functions as much as a cultural tribute as a commercial — an approach that, as Strategy reported in May 2021, was described as an intentional use of cultural ambiguity to deepen the brand's connection to Quebec identity.
The YouTube upload titled "New! Large Poutine | McDonald's Canada" accumulated approximately 5,394 views and 32 likes on the platform, as documented by Clapboard. While those figures represent a modest digital footprint for a brand of McDonald's scale, the campaign was designed primarily as an integrated broadcast and online effort across Quebec rather than a viral social play, with the 30-second television version and multiple cutdown formats indicating a media strategy weighted toward reach within the provincial market.
Coverage from Strategy and Campaign Canada in May 2021 confirmed the campaign received meaningful trade-press attention, with Strategy framing the work as a deliberate engagement with cultural ambiguity — a form of earned media validation that extends the campaign's reach beyond paid placements. The campaign was submitted to industry review by Daphné Cousineau of Cossette, signalling internal confidence in its creative merit.
No independent third-party sales data or brand-tracking results for the "Large Poutine. A Huge Legend." campaign are publicly available. Structurally, however, the integrated format — combining a hero film, television cutdowns, and short-form digital assets across a defined provincial geography with a clear product proposition — represents a well-engineered campaign architecture for driving both awareness and trial within the Quebec market. The Cossette and McDonald's Canada partnership has demonstrated award-level creative ambition previously, with Cossette's "Follow the Arches" campaign for McDonald's Canada winning the Cannes Lions Outdoor Grand Prix in 2018, according to Newswire Ca, establishing a credible creative lineage for this work.
McDonald's Canada launched this integrated campaign in Quebec in April 2021 to introduce a large-size poutine. Created by Cossette with media handled by OMD, it centres on a 60-second film tracing poutine's contested origin story, featuring real locations and people from Warwick and Drummondville connected to the dish's legend.
Le GED directed the 60-second hero film for the campaign. The production was shot on the outskirts of Victoriaville in Quebec and featured an original soundtrack composed by Vlooper of Alaclair Ensemble, a Quebec hip-hop collective, created specifically for the campaign.
McDonald's and Cossette chose the disputed origin story because it carries genuine cultural resonance across Quebec. Creative director Cédric Audet stated the team wanted advertising worthy of poutine's status as a Quebec icon, drawing on the unsettled debate over where the dish was invented to create culturally grounded storytelling rather than conventional product advertising.
The campaign comprised a 60-second hero film, a 30-second television version, and six-second and 15-second online cutdowns, according to Strategy. Media buying was handled by OMD. The campaign ran from late April through the end of May 2021 across McDonald's restaurants throughout Quebec.
The campaign received a Clapboard Score of 63 out of 100. The score reflects a well-structured integrated campaign with strong cultural grounding and authentic production craft, balanced against a limited measurable digital footprint and the inherently regional scope of the Quebec-only rollout.
Cossette and McDonald's Canada have a documented history of culturally ambitious collaboration. Cossette created the "Follow the Arches" campaign for McDonald's Canada in 2018, which won the Cannes Lions Outdoor Grand Prix that year, according to newswire.ca, establishing the creative partnership's capacity for internationally recognised, insight-driven work.
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