Diageo and Coca Cola launch £3.5m summer campaign

Published: 19 April, 2012

Diageo has teamed up with Coca Cola to celebrate the British Summer in £3.5 million off-trade campaign centred around the season's patriotic events.

The companies are launching a series of limited edition bottles, featuring Union Flag designs for Gordon's and Pimm's bottles, 1l bottles of Schweppes lemonade and Schweppes tonic, and premix cans of Gordon's and Pimm's.

For the third year in a row, Diageo spirits and Schweppes mixers will continue their joint initiative to promote long mixed spirit drinks. To help consumers create their own at home, the activity will promote simple serves.

Last year the initiative attracted an extra 528,000 households into the spirits category over the summer, according to Nielsen data. Gordons's gin has grown by 14% over the last 52 weeks.

Philip Murphy, shopper marketing manager at Diageo GB said: "Last summer the royal wedding was a great boost for the off-trade with growth of Gordon's up 138% and Pimm's 567% in the month of April. We have high hopes for a repeat of that performance this year with consumers coming together to celebrate the Queen's Diamond Jubilee and enjoy popular supporting events with family and friends at home."

Brett Page, commercial strategy manager at Coca-Cola Enterprises added that 2011's royal wedding and other holidays "combined with great weather meant that more people were out shopping ahead of the event and many categories experienced sales uplifts". "Soft drinks, and in particular the CCE portfolio, saw fantastic results with total soft drinks volume growing 10.3% in the two weeks leading to bank holiday weekend and CCE volume growing by 24.1%."

The firms are offering retailers on-pack customisations and in-store POS and the activity will be supported by an integrated campaign featuring outdoor, radio, press and digital activity.

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