ROTTERDAM, 4 May 2026 – KFC Nederland has chosen Rotterdam-region dad Daniel Alvarado as the winner of its national search for a new KFC sound logo. Alvarado, who lives in Poortugaal and makes music alongside his daily job, was selected from almost 800 entries after KFC skipped the usual agency route and opened the brief to makers across the country.
The winning track will become the official sound of KFC Nederland for the next two years. Alvarado receives €15,000, while his sound will be used in Dutch KFC brand campaigns.
Rotterdam dad wins national brief
Alvarado entered the competition after seeing the call on social media. He produces under the name d2nzmusic and was surprised at home by sor and the KFC team, with his family there for the reveal. That family moment gives the story its charm. This was not a polished agency handover, but a Rotterdam dad being surprised at home after turning a 30-second music brief into a national brand sound.
KFC skipped the agency route
KFC launched the search in March with artist and producer sor as curator. Instead of asking an agency or internal team to create the new brand sound, the chain invited producers, beatmakers and bedroom musicians to submit their own version of a Dutch KFC sound.
The brief was specific. Participants had to create a 30-second track that could work under different KFC commercials, with rhythm, energy and a compact sound logo at the end, similar to a producer tag, timed to the end card where the KFC logo appears.
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Beat and recognition mattered
The entries were judged on beat, tempo, recognisability and how well the music worked under moving images. The aim was simple, but not easy: create a sound that people could link to KFC within a few seconds.
Alvarado’s winning idea came from that need to stay in people’s heads. “I wanted to create something that sticks, almost like a slogan,” he said. The surprise at home caught him off guard: “When they were at my door, my first feeling was pure joy and pride.”
Sor guided the selection
Sor, the stage name of Rosario Mussendijk, was brought in to guide the selection and help develop the winning track into the final sound logo. His own work moves between hip-hop, classical composition and electronic music, which made him a fitting choice for a brief that needed something more musical than a standard advertising jingle.
The artist became known to a wider Dutch audience through Maestro and Wie is de Mol?, while his album Bae Doven helped underline his position as one of the more interesting Dutch artists working across genre lines. ADE notes that sor won two Edison Awards in 2023, for Best Album and Best Hip Hop.
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Community shaped the campaign
The campaign was also a brand move in itself. By asking the public to create the sound, KFC turned the search into a campaign before the final track had even been chosen. Sor described that idea clearly during the selection process. “Look, you can just have someone make it, and then you have it. Or you let the people themselves be part of it. And that in itself is already a whole campaign,” he said.
New KFC sound for two years
The winning track has now been further developed with sor into the final sound logo. It will be heard in KFC Nederland campaigns over the next two years, giving Alvarado’s work a national audience. For a dad from the Rotterdam region, that is quite a jump: from making music at home to creating the sound that will sit under a major brand’s Dutch campaigns. Not bad for a 30-second brief, honestly.
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