How Zilch Turned Buy Now Pay Later Into a British Cultural Moment
Zilch's 'Have Your Cake And Eat It' is a 30-second UK television and online film campaign created by St Luke's, launched on 5 September 2021, positioning the buy now pay later brand as a zero-interest, consumer-first alternative for electronics and technology purchases across the United Kingdom.
Zilch entered the United Kingdom advertising landscape with this campaign as its first-ever TV appearance, a milestone that also marked St Luke's inaugural work as the brand's creative agency of record — an appointment made without a competitive pitch. The campaign's central proposition, expressed through the tagline 'The sweetest way to pay,' communicated a deceptively simple idea: that consumers could access the technology and products they wanted immediately, without incurring interest charges or navigating the complexity of traditional credit. The idiomatic title distils that promise into an instantly recognisable cultural shorthand.
In the United Kingdom, the campaign ran across television, online video, social media, digital display, and print partnerships with the Daily Mail and Metro, according to reporting by Creative Salon and confirmed via St Luke's. Media planning and buying was handled by MNC. The campaign comprised a hero 30-second TV spot supported by digital and social executions, including a celebrated outdoor-style static that featured a cake shaped like a trainer accompanied by the line 'New shoes? Piece of cake.' — extending the central metaphor into product-specific contexts. The Clapboard Score for this campaign is 54 out of 100, reflecting solid creative ambition offset by limited measurable public impact data.
Zilch operates in the buy now pay later sector, a category that was expanding at exceptional speed across the United Kingdom in 2021. According to Bain, BNPL transaction values in the UK were growing at approximately 60 to 70 percent annually, with around 10.1 million UK consumers having used a BNPL product in the preceding year. By November 2021, more than 17 million UK customers had used a BNPL company for an online purchase, according to data cited by Lewis Silkin. These figures contextualise the competitive urgency behind Zilch's decision to invest in mass-market television for the first time.
The United Kingdom BNPL market in 2021 was dominated by established players including Klarna and Clearpay, both of which had built significant consumer recognition through sustained digital marketing. Klarna, in particular, had run high-profile celebrity-driven campaigns in the UK market. Against this backdrop, St Luke's strategic brief was to carve a distinctive space for Zilch — not by matching competitors on scale, but by establishing an emotional and cultural identity that felt genuinely different. The agency chose to lead with joy and empowerment rather than the rational mechanics of deferred payment, a meaningful distinction in a category prone to transactional messaging.
The campaign's target audience was digitally fluent UK consumers who were already familiar with flexible payment options but had yet to commit to a preferred provider. By anchoring the creative in a universally understood idiom and expressing it through movement and energy, St Luke's gave Zilch a personality that neither Klarna's irony-led celebrity work nor Clearpay's lifestyle positioning had occupied. Richard Denney, Executive Creative Director at St Luke's, described the brief as an opportunity to 'help drive fame' for a brand on a mission, as reported by St Luke's. The strategic logic was straightforward: in a crowded fintech category, fame-building through broadcast television could compress the trust-building timeline considerably.
Freestyle dancer Sharifa Tonkmor anchors the 'Have Your Cake And Eat It' film. Tonkmor, who previously appeared on BBC Young Dancer as noted by Creative Salon and St Luke's, brings a kinetic, joyful energy to the 30-second spot that translates the campaign's core proposition — effortless access, no compromise — into physical language. The decision to lead with dance rather than product demonstration or talking-head testimony is a deliberate creative risk, betting on emotional resonance over explanatory clarity.
Production was handled by Dreamjob and Curate Films, according to Creative Salon. The film's visual grammar is built around movement, colour, and the recurring cake motif, which functions simultaneously as the campaign's central metaphor and its most mnemonic visual device. Rather than relying on product UI screens or price-point callouts typical of fintech advertising, the creative team at St Luke's constructed a world in which the feeling of using Zilch — frictionless, satisfying, pleasurable — is the dominant message.
The campaign voiceover reinforces that emotional register, delivering the proposition in tone that feels celebratory rather than instructional. Supporting executions extended the cake metaphor with wit and precision: the image of a trainer-shaped cake paired with the line 'New shoes? Piece of cake.' demonstrates how the creative platform could flex across categories and formats without losing coherence. Richard Denney's influence as Executive Creative Director at St Luke's is visible in the campaign's willingness to subordinate product information to brand feeling — a craft choice that positions Zilch as a brand with genuine cultural ambition rather than a fintech product seeking category recognition. Amabel Polglase, Chief Marketing Officer at Zilch, confirmed the strategic alignment, stating that St Luke's had done 'a fantastic job at bringing to life our brand and the feeling you get when you pay with Zilch,' as reported by St Luke's and Adobo Magazine.
No independently verified campaign performance data for 'Have Your Cake And Eat It' is publicly available in terms of direct brand lift, conversion uplift, or attributed customer acquisition figures. The campaign registered 1,682 views and one like on the archive submission reviewed by Clapboard, figures that reflect archive engagement rather than the campaign's actual broadcast reach across UK television, online video, and digital channels.
What is structurally observable is the effectiveness of the campaign's market timing. Launching on 5 September 2021, Zilch entered UK broadcast advertising at a moment when, according to Bain, approximately 25 percent of UK e-commerce shoppers were already using BNPL products — an audience primed for brand differentiation rather than category education. A television debut in that environment, supported by print placements in the Daily Mail and Metro, gave the campaign meaningful reach across demographics that digital-only competitors were less likely to penetrate efficiently.
Ed Palmer, Managing Director at St Luke's, described the partnership with Zilch as an opportunity to work with 'such an innovative fintech company,' as reported by St Luke's — language that signals mutual investment in long-term brand building rather than short-cycle performance marketing. Creative Salon published positive editorial coverage on 6 September 2021, the day after launch, indicating that the campaign landed with credibility in the UK creative industry. The Clapboard Score of 54 out of 100 reflects a campaign that executes its creative brief with genuine confidence but whose measurable public legacy remains limited by the absence of independently reported outcome data.
'Have Your Cake And Eat It' is Zilch's first-ever TV campaign, created by St Luke's and launched in the United Kingdom on 5 September 2021. The 30-second film positioned Zilch's buy now pay later virtual payment card as a zero-interest, frictionless alternative for consumers wanting electronics and technology products without financial compromise.
St Luke's created the campaign as Zilch's first creative agency of record, appointed without a pitch. Production was handled by Dreamjob and Curate Films, according to Creative Salon. Richard Denney served as Executive Creative Director at St Luke's, and media planning and buying was managed by MNC across UK television, digital, social, and print channels.
Sharifa Tonkmor, a freestyle dancer who previously appeared on BBC Young Dancer, features in the Zilch 2021 TV campaign. Tonkmor's performance anchors the 30-second film, using movement to communicate the brand's core proposition of effortless, joyful access to products without interest charges, as reported by Creative Salon and St Luke's.
Zilch launched on UK television to build brand fame rapidly in a crowded BNPL market. According to Bain, approximately 25 percent of UK e-commerce shoppers were already using buy now pay later products in 2021, making mass-reach broadcast media a logical choice for differentiating Zilch from established competitors including Klarna and Clearpay.
The campaign's creative proposition was 'The sweetest way to pay,' expressing the idea that consumers could obtain desired products immediately without interest or fees. The cake metaphor extended across executions, including a supporting static featuring a trainer-shaped cake with the line 'New shoes? Piece of cake,' as documented by St Luke's and Creative Salon.
The Clapboard Score for Zilch's 'Have Your Cake And Eat It' campaign is 54 out of 100. The score reflects confident creative execution and a well-timed UK market entry in September 2021, offset by the absence of independently verified performance outcome data in the public domain following the campaign's broadcast run.
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