Why is this work relevant for PR?

To gain relevance with young New Zealanders. Our national beer, Steinlager combined with Japanese brewing mastery to make Tokyo Dry. So we advertised it by taking New Zealand's most well-loved song and remaking it in Japan. But changing such an iconic, Kiwi song was risky, especially with our older more traditional Steinlager drinkers. We needed to ensure that the conversation was positive right from the start so the film was launched through PR and social, ensuring that on launch day TV presenters, radio DJs, journalists, and music reviewers were talking about it before the public even heard it.

Background

Steinlager is New Zealand's national beer. But they were seeing a worrying trend emerge as Kiwis in their 20s moved away from traditional NZ brands. For these young Kiwis, the classic, iconic Steinlager was a little bit old fashioned and uncool. With a quarter of the population living overseas and immigrants now making up another quarter of our demographic, NZ culture has changed. More and more, young Kiwis were looking overseas for inspiration and rejecting anything that represents 'old New Zealand' as they strive to appear more worldly. It was from this insight that Steinlager Tokyo Dry was born. A beer made from NZ ingredients and Japanese brewing mastery. Steinlager wanted to advertise this Japanese inspired beer without losing their NZ heritage, So we followed the format of Tokyo Dry by taking another iconic New Zealand classic and remaking it with Japanese masters of a different kind.

Describe the creative idea (20% of vote)

We took an iconic New Zealand song and remade it with Japanese musicians. Merging New Zealand and Japan to get a fresher take on our old kiwi classic. Just like Steinlager did when they made Tokyo Dry. To represent the New Zealand side of Tokyo Dry and our iconic Kiwi classic - Steinlager, We used another well-loved New Zealand classic ‘Slice of Heaven’ by Dave Dobbyn and Herbs. Pegged as NZs unofficial National Anthem, it's a song that every Kiwi knows and loves. Now, more than 20 years after it first appeared in the charts it was perfectly poised for an update to make it relevant to a whole new generation of young Kiwis. Then, to represent the Japanese side of Tokyo Dry, we collaborated with a range of Japanese musicians to remake Slice of Heaven. Each musician put their spin on the track, creating a true cultural mash-up.

Describe the strategy (30% of vote)

We needed to reach savvy young New Zealanders who rejected anything that looked like advertising so instead of treating the release of the song as a traditional advertising campaign, we treated it like any other song release with a music video, street posters, merchandise giveaways, PR and a social campaign – all intended to generate substantial hype and talkability around Tokyo Dry. Because the song is such a precious part of New Zealand culture we knew doing anything with it was risky. So on launch day, we asked Dave Dobbyn (the original singer and New Zealand's most famous musician) to release a video on his social pages showing him watching the music video for the first time, his genuine, enthusiastic reaction went a long way to making sure there were no negative comments.

Describe the execution (20% of vote)

The night before the launch, the countries most watched news show - Seven Sharp, played an exclusive first look at the music video. Then the next morning our biggest Newspaper, The NZ Herald ran a story about the song and shared the music video online as well on their social pages. Throughout the day radio DJs played and talked about the song and on social Dave Dobbyn shared the video of himself watching the music video. Over the next few days, all the Japanese musicians and the countries most popular radio stations also shared the music video on social. Dave Dobbyn also took part in several radio interviews to talk about the campaign (and the beer). The song was released on Spotify and iTunes and was accompanied by street posters, merchandise giveaways on social and cutdowns that appeared on TV and cinema.

List the results (30% of vote) – must include at least two of the following tiers:

Business Results Sales went up 44% in volume and 28% in value. Not only is the brand increasing penetration, it continues to bring new drinkers into the category. Communications Results Our version of ‘slice of heaven’ has earnt it’s own place in New Zealand culture. The whole campaign gained a reach of 4,915,813 (and New Zealand has a population of only 4.8 million). And a total earned media value of This online launch video alone gained: 472,229 Film Video completions (+77% exceeded delivery against benchmarks) 1,720,538 unique kiwis 18+ reached on social 557,479 engagements with social content with 602 shares

Please tell us how you designed/adapted your campaign for the single country / region / market where it aired.

Everything we did, we did with New Zealanders in mind. From our choice of song, to knowing how they would react if we released it in the wrong way. The song and music video appeared on New Zealand's most respected news shows, newspaper and radio stations and even their favorite singer was talked about it. Even asking the Japanese musicians to post and tweet about the music video on their social channels was a calculated move. As we know that there's nothing more important to Kiwis than having something from New Zealand recognized in another country,