DENVER--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sep. 29, 2016-- A new advertising campaign by Chipotle Mexican Grill (NYSE:CMG) spotlights their carefully selected ingredients and reinforces Chipotle’s commitment to sourcing, preparing and serving only the very best ingredients.

This Smart News Release features multimedia. View the full release here: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160929005803/en/

“We prepare all of our food using a very short list of ingredients,” said Mark Crumpacker, chief creative and development officer at Chipotle. “This allows us to obsess over each one in order to ensure that our food is absolutely delicious. This campaign takes a playful look at how all that attention has inflated the egos of our ingredients, resulting in a world in which we live to serve them — in every sense of the word.”

The campaign features a series of animated stop-motion short films along with online, outdoor, and radio advertising that tout the tagline, “’Tis their world. We just cook in it.” In addition to print, online, digital and social media distribution, the short films will be shown in movie theaters across the country, and Chipotle is considering airing them as television spots. The campaign was created in partnership withAustin-based GSD&M and award-winning animation studio HouseSpecial.

"‘’Tis their world, we just cook in it’ was born from the reality that at Chipotle, there’s nothing more superior or respected than the ingredients,” said Jay Russell, chief creative officer at GSD&M. “So much so, that ingredients get the royal treatment—literally. Ingredients Reign captures that worshipping and pampering, bringing Chipotle’s obsession for fresh ingredients to life.”

"The tone of this campaign is just the right combination of surreal whimsy and crafted beauty,” said Kirk Kelley, creative director and partner at HouseSpecial. “By creating the spots in stop motion, HouseSpecial's artists were able to give the regal Ingredients their proper home, set them into a playful – but decidedly noble – backdrop and capture the inherent intrigue and paparazzi-fueled frenzy that Royalty always garners."

For years Chipotle has been providing fresh, responsibly raised ingredients grown and raised with respect for farmers, animals and the environment. This includes serving Responsibly Raised meats, ingredients that are not genetically engineered, certain organic produce items and a majority of dairy from cows raised on pasture.

For more information and to view the campaign, please visit chipotle.com/ingredientsreign.

ABOUT CHIPOTLE

Steve Ells, founder, chairman and co-CEO, started Chipotle with the idea that food served fast did not have to be a typical fast food experience. Today, Chipotle continues to offer a focused menu of burritos, tacos, burrito bowls (a burrito without the tortilla) and salads made from fresh, high-quality raw ingredients, prepared using classic cooking methods and served in a distinctive atmosphere. Through our vision of Food With Integrity, Chipotle is seeking better food from using ingredients that are not only fresh, but that — where possible — are sustainably grown and raised responsibly with respect for the animals, the land and the farmers who produce the food. In order to achieve this vision, we focus on building a special people culture that is centered on creating teams of top performers empowered to achieve high standards. This people culture not only leads to a better dining experience for our customers, it also allows us to develop future leaders from within. Chipotle opened with a single restaurant in 1993 and operates more than 2,000 restaurants, including 24 Chipotle restaurants outside the US and 14 ShopHouse Southeast Asian Kitchen restaurants, and is an investor in an entity that owns and operates four Pizzeria Locale restaurants. For more information, visit Chipotle.com.

ABOUT GSD&M

Founded in 1971, GSD&M is a creatively driven, full-service agency headquartered in Austin, Texas, that believes when you pay the price to understand the problem and apply that insight to solve courageously, the reward is ideas that make a difference. With a restless culture and purpose as a guiding force, GSD&M builds brands with a fully integrated creative, media and analytics approach. For more information, visit GSDM.com.

ABOUT HOUSESPECIAL

“Animation isn’t just a storytelling medium – it’s our life force and our passion.”

HouseSpecial, formerly LAIKA/house, can make anything move. We are animation experts. Our Portland creative team is globally known for our ability to develop characters in narrative environments for iconic brands like M&M’S, Supercell’s Boom Beach, Planters, Apple, ESPN, Target and Honey Nut Cheerios. We have collaborated with advertising agencies GSD&M, Barton F. Graf, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, Wieden+Kennedy, TBWA\CHIAT\DAY, Leo Burnett and BBDO among others on hundreds of spots – many of which earned big awards and are part of advertising lore.

The studio, under the leadership of President EP Lourri Hammack, Chief Creative Officer and Creative Director Kirk Kelley and Chief Operating Officer Alvaro Cubillas, specializes in short- to mid-form animated content in 2D, CG and stop-motion mediums. Website: housespecial.com.

View source version on businesswire.com: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20160929005803/en/

Source: Chipotle Mexican Grill

Chipotle Mexican Grill
Chris Arnold, 303-222-5912
carnold@chipotle.com