Rozalach campaign by Landwer and Dani Levy Communications – Israel’s first commercial NFT campaign

“Rozalach” is one of Israel’s most beloved and famous desserts. The soft pastries from Landwer Café have become a cult dessert and the ultimate guilty pleasure, surrounded by mythology.

So much so that when the news website Haaretz once published the recipe, it became the most-read page on the site. And when we shared the recipe on our (almost inactive) Facebook page, which has just a few hundred followers, we received thousands of likes and comments — even more than the number of followers. People began tagging each other, creating a chain reaction of engagement that was rare at the time.

Yet the dessert, invented by Landwer and registered as a trademark, became a generic name, and hundreds of cafés across the country started serving it as their own, sometimes even listing it as an official menu item.

I even found myself once arguing with a journalist who claimed “Rozalach is a Haifa chain invention,” but after I explained the origin, she was convinced (for those who don’t know: The founders of Landwer — Ofer Koren, Oren Maor, and Nir Caspi — previously (and still) owned a popular bar called Rosa Parks. After long army shifts, they’d treat themselves to the only dessert they could whip up in their tiny kitchen. Later, when founding Landwer, they named the dessert “Rozalach” as a nod to Rosa Parks).

Fast-forward 18 years to June 2022, the peak of the Web3 and NFT craze. When collectibles exploded, Dani Levy gathered the staff and said: “We need to find a client to create the first commercial NFT in Israel.”

Before we could even email clients, Dani already closed the deal with Ofer Koren (Landwer’s managing partner) and unstoppable CMO Daphna Rosenzweig. Dani knew Rozalach was a soft spot for Ofer, and convinced him to launch a set of six cute Rozalach NFTs, granting their holders a free dessert at every branch for a year.

“This way,” Dani said, “we’ll show the world just how beloved Rozalach is, and lock it in as Landwer’s intellectual property — on the blockchain.”

So the project got the green light. Our friends at Fusionary helped with the design, concept, and smart contract. Two weeks later, the NFT launched and generated massive positive media buzz, with a media valuation of over ₪15 million (mainly the value of desserts given out to NFT holders), not to mention the unmeasurable buzz — like being featured in marketing courses at Reichman University and other top academic institutions.

Above all, the campaign did what it needed to: reminded everyone of the original source of Rozalach and put an end to the “pirate” appropriation of this beloved Israeli dessert.