CAN YOU TEACH A NEW DOG OLD TRICKS? JUST MAYBE.
Grand Marnier, historically one of the world’s most iconic spirits brands, needed a new source of volume. Not surprisingly, many in their core target were aging. Hell, some were even dying. Growth was essential.
Enter Male Millennials. (Take a look here if you’d like to see a different audience we talked to in the Canadian market.)
But how do you get African American and Hispanic men in their 20s interested in an orange flavoured Cognac from France? Well, you take a cue from the founder. 150 years ago Alexander Marnier -- the creator of Grand Marnier -- was a rebellious young trendsetter. His blending of fine Cognac, sugar, and orange was, at the time, unheard of. His neighbours and competitors thought he was nuts. Young Alexander didn’t care.
Bingo. That thought was as interesting today as it was then. The “blending and mixing of unexpected things” was where we would play.
The idea was summated in a new tagline: BLEND OUT. We would show how the blending of seemingly disparate things could form amazing new creations.
In many ways this is how a trendsetting Millennial lives his life; he mixes styles, and music, and experiences, and relationships to form new and unique hybrids.
Take a look at some of the executions below. One thing to note; it is 100% digital. To be successful with this crowd, you got fish where the fish are.
A film about a Beatboxer transforming various genres of music was part of the launch.
Not only did it present that brand in a whole new way, it connected Grand Manier to the world of music.
A partnership with Soundhound named THE DNA OF MUSIC allowed users to discover the original samples / source material found in so many contemporary tracks.
A partnership was formed with World-renowned DJ A-Trak.
A-Trak is a master at creating new tracks using samples from various genres and eras.
Part of the partnership included asking users of Sound Cloud to remix the music stems from our YouTube film.
Final sumbissions will be judged and awarded by A-Trak himself.
Grand Marnier and Spotify connected to offer users the ability to develop unique playlists. Users were asked to pick two artists. We would develop a unique playlest that blended the two styles.
Yelp users now had the ability to find out what bars and clubs were holding events that epitomized the BLEND OUT idea.
A-first-of-its-kind partnersip between Grand Marnier and Universal Music had Grand Marnier advertising placed in the actual content of Universal artists.