State Farm Turns NFL Season Into a Bundling Insurance Lesson
State Farm's 2023-24 football campaign uses NFL running back Derrick Henry to dramatise the savings available through bundling home and auto insurance under the brand's Personal Price Plan, with the character Jake from State Farm observing as Henry performs an increasingly unconventional workout routine inspired by those very savings.
The campaign launched in September 2023 in the United States, timed to coincide with the opening of the 2023-24 NFL season. The specific Derrick Henry execution, titled "Workout Bundle," debuted on October 15, 2023, during the Baltimore Ravens versus Tennessee Titans game, as documented by ispot.tv and marcom.com. Created by The Marketing Arm, known in the industry as TMA, the spot belongs to a broader series of humorous State Farm football commercials that have featured Jake from State Farm alongside prominent NFL figures including Patrick Mahomes, Coach Andy Reid, and Travis Kelce, as reported by MediaPost.
The campaign's central objective is to translate an abstract financial benefit — the savings generated by bundling insurance products — into a tangible, emotionally resonant scenario. By anchoring the savings message to Henry's exaggerated physical performance, State Farm converts a rational purchase consideration into an entertaining cultural moment. The Personal Price Plan serves as the campaign's through-line across all executions in the series, reinforcing that bundling home and auto insurance is not merely a transactional convenience but a meaningful way to reduce costs. In the United States, where insurance advertising is among the most competitive and highest-spending categories in media, that kind of creative specificity carries strategic weight beyond mere entertainment value.
State Farm held approximately 18% of the U.S. personal auto insurance market in 2023, according to data cited by southfloridareporter.com and rpsins.com, making it the largest personal lines insurer in the country by market share. That position comes with an obligation to defend scale while simultaneously driving product depth, and bundling home and auto insurance directly serves both goals by increasing customer retention and average revenue per household.
The strategic rationale for aligning the 2023-24 football campaign with the NFL is well-supported by the broader media landscape. In the United States, NFL programming consistently dominates broadcast and streaming ratings across the autumn and winter months, delivering the kind of mass simultaneous viewership that few other media vehicles can match. State Farm's decision to debut the Derrick Henry spot during a live NFL game, as documented by ispot.tv, reflects a deliberate investment in appointment television at a moment when most advertising inventory is fragmenting across digital platforms.
The competitive context matters here. Rivals including Geico and Allstate have historically deployed high-frequency, character-driven creative strategies in the U.S. insurance market. State Farm's answer, developed with The Marketing Arm, is to deepen the Jake from State Farm character ecosystem rather than simply increase media weight. By rotating NFL figures — Derrick Henry, Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce, and Andy Reid — through the same Jake-anchored creative framework, State Farm builds both reach and coherence simultaneously. The U.S. property-and-casualty insurance sector recorded approximately $859.9 billion in net premiums written in 2023, up 10.0% year over year, according to S&P Global, underscoring the scale of the market State Farm is competing to lead across personal auto and home insurance categories.
The Marketing Arm constructed the "Workout Bundle" spot around a single comic premise: that the savings Derrick Henry receives from bundling his home and auto insurance with State Farm are so significant they inspire a physically absurd new training regimen. That premise is both brand-functional and inherently visual, giving the production team a clear mandate to escalate the absurdity of Henry's workout while keeping Jake from State Farm in the role of bemused straight man.
Creative direction on the campaign was led by Harris Wilkinson, Chief Creative Officer at The Marketing Arm, with Rick Utzinger serving as Executive Director of Creative, as documented by ispot.tv and mediapost.com. The pairing of a physically imposing NFL running back with the understated Jake from State Farm character — played by Kevin Mimms, who replaced the original Jake Stone in the role in 2020, as noted by newsroom.statefarm.com — creates a reliable comic dynamic that the broader campaign series has used consistently across its NFL talent roster.
The spot's thirty-second runtime disciplines the storytelling tightly. The setup, escalation, and payoff — including a brief moment involving a dog on a couch — are compressed into a format optimised for both broadcast and digital pre-roll, ensuring the brand message lands within the first few seconds for viewers who may not watch to completion. The campaign's visual language is bright, domestic, and deliberately ordinary in its setting, which amplifies the comedic contrast of Henry's exaggerated athleticism. Production credits beyond those named above for the "State Farm Football" campaign are not fully and publicly documented across available sources.
No verified third-party performance data for the State Farm "Workout Bundle" or the broader 2023-24 football campaign is publicly available at the time of this analysis. No figures for view counts, brand lift, recall scores, or sales attribution have been released by State Farm or The Marketing Arm in publicly accessible sources. The Clapboard Score for this campaign is not available.
Structurally, however, the campaign demonstrates several characteristics associated with high-performing insurance advertising in the United States. The decision to debut the Derrick Henry spot during a live NFL broadcast on October 15, 2023 — documented by ispot.tv — maximises simultaneous reach at a moment of high audience engagement. The spot's thirty-second format is compatible with both linear television and digital pre-roll distribution, extending effective reach across platforms without requiring separate production assets.
The campaign's reliance on the established Jake from State Farm character reduces the cognitive load required for brand attribution. As reported by MediaPost, State Farm's consistent use of Jake across its football advertising series creates a recognisable creative framework that individual spots can populate with new talent — in this case Derrick Henry — without sacrificing brand clarity. The Personal Price Plan bundling message is embedded in the comic narrative rather than stated as a product claim, which research in the category consistently suggests improves message retention among consumers who are otherwise resistant to direct insurance advertising. In the United States, where eMarketer has tracked sustained growth in digital video advertising consumption, the campaign's format flexibility positions it well for multi-platform performance.
The Derrick Henry Workout Bundle spot shows the NFL running back performing an unconventional workout inspired by the savings he receives from bundling home and auto insurance with State Farm. Jake from State Farm observes throughout. The ad promotes State Farm's Personal Price Plan and was created by The Marketing Arm, debuting in October 2023.
State Farm launched its 2023-24 football campaign in September 2023 in the United States, timed to the NFL season opener. The Derrick Henry Workout Bundle spot specifically debuted on October 15, 2023, during the Baltimore Ravens versus Tennessee Titans game, as documented by ispot.tv and marcom.com.
The Marketing Arm, also known as TMA, created the State Farm football campaign. Harris Wilkinson served as Chief Creative Officer and Rick Utzinger as Executive Director of Creative, as reported by ispot.tv and MediaPost. The Marketing Arm has served as State Farm's lead creative agency partner since around the brand's 2020 reset.
State Farm's 2023-24 football campaign series features Jake from State Farm alongside multiple NFL figures. As reported by MediaPost, the broader series includes Patrick Mahomes, Coach Andy Reid, and Travis Kelce, each appearing in separate executions that use the same bundling savings message under State Farm's Personal Price Plan framework.
The campaign promotes bundling home and auto insurance through State Farm's Personal Price Plan. Each spot in the 2023-24 football series frames bundling as a meaningful way for customers to achieve savings, translating that financial benefit into humorous scenarios involving NFL talent and the Jake from State Farm character, as documented across MediaPost and ispot.tv coverage.
State Farm timed its 2023-24 football campaign to NFL broadcasts to reach mass simultaneous audiences during one of television's highest-rated programming windows. In the United States, State Farm held approximately 18% of the personal auto insurance market, according to southfloridareporter.com, making broad reach a priority for defending and extending its market-leading position.
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