Capital C founder and CEO Tony Chapman says calling the activation behind the partnership that Temple Street Productions has with Loblaws for the show Recipe to Riches a product integration is a gross understatement.

“A typical show’s product integration is, ‘let’s get a Pepsi cup in front of Simon on The X Factor, let’s get Erica driving a Ford on Being Erica,'” says Chapman, who is also a judge on the new reality show. “What we have on Recipe to Riches isn’t product integration, it’s product creation.”

The show, which premiered last night at 9 p.m. on  Shaw Media’s Food Network and repeats Saturdays at 8 p.m. on Global Television, gives Canadians the opportunity to turn their family recipe into a President’s Choice product at Loblaws stores across the country.

A Recipe to Riches winner is chosen each week for one of the seven categories on the show, with the recipe being turned into a product which hits Loblaws store shelves by that weekend, so viewers can taste the product for themselves, explains Barb Williams, senior VP of content at Shaw Media.

“The real trick is that there are so many competition shows out there, but when people sing on TV and you think it should sound better you can’t really tell for sure,” she says. “With this, we are getting the products to people so they can taste it. You have to taste the food to get it, so the partnership with Loblaws is an integral piece to the Recipe to Riches story.”

Temple Street Productions managing director John Young says when his company came up with the idea for the show around two years ago they knew that the bragging rights of having a family recipe made and sold in supermarkets was something they wanted to add to the traditional cash prize of reality television shows.

Loblaws was the first and only company Temple Street contacted for the partnership and they signed on immediately, says Young.

In addition to promoting each week’s winning product with in-store displays and signage, Loblaws will be hosting events to promote the week’s winning product and getting customers to taste it. At the end of the seven weeks, Canadians will be voting for the winning product, with the contestant with the most votes going home with $250,000 and their product finding a more permanent spot on Loblaws store shelves.

The show is being shopped around to international distributors such as the BBC, and Temple Street and Capital C are pitching it to US networks within the next few weeks, says Young. The partnership between Temple Street and Capital C has a few more branded content buns in the oven, with shows in various stages of development, he adds.

[iframe_youtube video=”0O3WsOrbPCo”]