Heineken: HEINEKEN LIMITED EDITION

Credits & Description:

Category: Best Integrated Campaign Led by PR

Advertiser: HEINEKEN

Product/Service: HEINEKEN

Agency: IRIS WORLDWIDE

Agency: AKQA

Group Account Director/Public-Relations: Vicki Harding (Iris)

Account Director/Public-Relations: Jane Walton (Iris)

Account Executive/Public-Relations: Rachel Newman (Iris)

Account Assistant/Public-Relations: Lizzie Colville (Iris)

Account Manager: Joe Walmsley (Akqa)

Planning Director: Laurence Parkes (Akqa)

Associate Creative Director: Ivar Eden (Akqa)

Managing Director/Amsterdam: Chris Friend (Iris)

Art Director/Amsterdam: Glenn Doherty (Iris)

Senior Account Manager/Amsterdam: Matt Atherton (Iris)

Creative Director: Ramses Dingenouts (Dbod)

Heineken Concept Development Manager: Els Dijkhuizen (Heineken International)

Global Head of Design: Mark Van Iterson (Heineken International)

Heineken Brand Consumer Public-Relations Officer: Marnie Kontovraki (Heineken International)

Senior Account Manager: Amy Vickery (Iris)

Social Media Content Creative: Kevin McGlade (Iris)

Director: Nick Esdaile (Dab Hand Media)

Producer: Greg Jordan (Dab Hand Media)

Manager Heineken Digital: Lennart Boorsma (Heineken International)

Media placement: Consumer/digital PR - Targeted online design and cultural titles - 01 December '11 - 30 March '12

Media placement: Digital - Competition entry hub on Facebook - 01 December '11 - 31st Jan '12

Media placement: POS - In store POS in 30 markets - 01 December '11 onwards

Media placement: Bottle design - 'Future Bottle' sold in Limited Edition packs, driving entry to campaign hub (Facebook) - 01 December '11 onwards



Summary of the Campaign

Brief

Engage the global design community. Design was identified as a core pillar for Heineken to support its long-term global strategy. Although the brand has always highly valued design, Limited Edition would be its first foray to communicating with and engaging this audience on a broad scale.



Response

A global mission challenging designers to create Heineken's 'Future Bottle’ and have their design (and name) appear on one million aluminum Heineken bottles globally, in a special 140-year anniversary, Limited Edition gift pack.



An innovative social twist asked them to create a bottle design symbolising how people will connect in the future and 'connect' it with another. Each entry consisted of a pair of design strangers joining designs to create one unique bottle.



Heineken's global Facebook page acted asb the hub, and the campaign was activated through PR and social media, single-mindedly targeting the design community via strategic partnerships, design school seeding and content-rich stories. A retail pack also drove entries, featuring a blank canvas bottle, inviting uptake of the challenge.



Results

30,000+ competition entries, connections spanning the globe

Designers invested time in creating 3,000 individual designs

300+ articles in targeted design and marketing media

107,144 visits to the Facebook hub (145 countries)



The Situation

Product design and innovation has always been important to Heineken, but never more so than today with the rise of the design-conscious consumer who defines premiumness through high quality design.



But whilst always at the heart of the brand, design is not a space it had previously operated in from a communications perspective and designers had never been considered a key audience before last year, when its core ‘design beyond beer’ strategy was developed.



The challenge was to begin to get a design audience to engage with the Heineken brand and take it seriously as a credible and legitimate player.



The Goal

The goal was to engage designers around the world with Heineken, with a core objective to achieve 1,000 individual designs and many more connections. This would demonstrate that designers were willing to invest precious time and energy into the brand.



The target audience was defined as the global design community, consisting of designers (students/those working in design) and design-interested consumers.



Research was undertaken to identify key influencers and channels – people, organisations and media titles - that could credibly and powerfully deliver messages about the challenge. The right content to make an impact on the audience was also identified.



The Strategy

Credibility and integrity was key to the success of the campaign. Everything had to feel innovative and instinctive to the design community – other brands do design competitions, but Heineken Limited Edition would be a ‘design brief’.



Judges were recruited for their influence on the audience and access to large networks of designers: Mark Dytham, architect/co-founder of creative network PechaKucha and Evan Orensten, co-founder Cool Hunting design blog. Leveraging media and event partnerships maximised these relationships.



Listening closely to what design titles wanted, visual content was created throughout to gain cut-through across several stages of the challenge, ensuring media covered it start to finish, driving entries/engagement and celebrating winners.



Knowing recognition is so important to designers, the winners’ reward was strategic. To trigger quality entries and deep engagement, the pair’s design (and names) would appear on 1m Heineken aluminum bottles.



Heineken markets were also provided with campaign assets for activation.



Execution

In December, global design media was targeted with a launch story inviting virtual strangers to ‘design the future’ together, whilst judges communicated via their networks. A week later movie content illustrating the challenge was issued.



Knowing design schools have huge influence, 23 tutors at top colleges/universities were recruited as credible voices encouraging entry by students.



Seven PechaKucha Nights (Tokyo to Miami) were leveraged to physically reach designers in a credible environment.



A specially created advert was featured on the back of high-end design title Disengo in return for providing Heineken at its launch party.



Ensuring openness and legitimacy, the judging process (top 100 entries down to three) was released as content. Finalist pairs then refined and presented their entries in March.



A final movie/PR story was issued widely allowing the credibility story to travel further across the design community, giving the winning pair recognition and creating legacy for year 2.



Documented Results

Exceeded expectation in every deliverable.



Behaviour change: Designs created for Heineken’s future bottle

• 30,827 ‘connected’ entries led to one outstanding bottle design

• 2,919 designs submitted, designers took the brief to heart



Lee Dunford, freelance designer/member of winning design pair: “My design featured on a Heineken bottle - WOW!”



Engagement

• 2 leading influential judges recruited (Cool Hunting's Evan Orensten & PechaKucha's Mark Dytham):

• 7 PechaKuchas reached 2,000+ creatives

• 2.5m+ OTS Cool Hunting

• 23 design schools reached 49,093+ students

• 107,144 Facebook visits, 414,138 views (145 countries)

• 37,000 likes, 3.55 mins average dwell

• 4 movies, 74,000+ views



Awareness:

• 300+ targeted design and marketing articles (33+ countries)

• 142 media outlet/design network postings socially (1,697,832 reach)

• 30 Heineken markets activated



Outcomes

• Heineken will produce 1.2m winning aluminium bottles via Limited Edition Gift Packs, launching year two of the competition, December 2012