How HelloFresh and O2 Unlocked a New Model for Brand Partnerships

HelloFresh is the world’s leading meal kit company, serving millions of customers across three continents. HelloFresh works with Awin to power its affiliate and brand partnership activity, driving new customer acquisition at scale.

O2 is one of the UK's largest mobile network operators, with a rewards ecosystem (O2 Priority) that gives millions of customers access to exclusive perks and offers from major brands, including HelloFresh.

The challenge

For subscription brands, brand partnerships offer something that’s hard to replicate anywhere else.

A household name endorsing your product to its entire customer base with all credibility that comes with it? That quality of advocacy is tough to match. But for HelloFresh, accessing that kind of partner came with a structural problem.

HelloFresh's standard affiliate offer was restricted to new customers only. That made commercial sense, but it created a barrier with premium partners.

O2, prioritizing customer satisfaction, was hesitant to promote an offer restricted to new customers only, as it excluded their existing HelloFresh subscribers. This requirement represented a key challenge that needed a unique solution to move the partnership forward.

Knowing just how successful the partnership could be, Awin began picking apart the technical issues to see if a solution could be found.

The solution

The teams explored a way for HelloFresh to boost both acquisition and retention with a dual offer.

HelloFresh built a bespoke mechanism designed specifically for the O2 partnership, with Awin brokering the arrangement and providing the tracking infrastructure to make it viable.

When O2 customers clicked through from its rewards program, O2 Priority, they landed on a dedicated HelloFresh page and self-identified as either a new or existing customer.

The platform then routed them accordingly:

• New customers received a high-value acquisition offer (55% off a first HelloFresh box + 20% off for the two months that followed)
• Existing customers received a genuine loyalty reward to increase their likelihood of staying subscribed (20% off for two months)

With two distinct customer journeys running through a single partner link, Awin’s tracking infrastructure was essential for validating the commercial model and ensuring HelloFresh could measure the true incremental value being generated across both streams. A closed-loop setup also kept the offers exclusive to O2's customer base, protecting the broader affiliate ecosystem.

The build required close collaboration across HelloFresh's pricing, tech, and commercial teams to break the “acquisition cycle” and drive significant retention KPIs, turning wasted clicks into opportunities to keep customers on board.

The results

The extra work did more than kick-start the partnership and enhance the experience for O2 customers: it had a genuine impact on HelloFresh’s customer retention.

HelloFresh exceeded its new customer sales target by +31%. That discount created an outlay, which was more than covered by the striking numbers from the existing customer cohort.

The number of existing customers claiming the loyalty offer also surpassed HelloFresh’s target by a staggering 350%, while order volumes increased by +25%.

These results prove that high-volume acquisition partners can simultaneously drive retention, reduce cancellations, and increase order frequency among loyal users. By breaking its own rules for the right partner, HelloFresh and Awin turned a blocker into a breakthrough.

Interested in running acquisition and retention plays with brands like O2? Launch brand partnerships on Awin.