Ketchup

Hot on the heels of Gaymers cider comes Swedish brand Kopparberg, another cider brand hoping to exploit the still buoyant UK cider market with targeted festival activity within a wider music marketing strategy.

The “One Big Tree” experiential concept will be present at both Camp Bestival and Connect, and centres around the Kopparberg Tree.  During the day you can chill and drink Kopparberg under the shade of the tree (nice reference to an idyllic way of drinking cider), whilst at night the tree will ‘come to life’ and provide the backdrop to a bit of a lively shindig.

Nice stuff, although the combined footfall of both events is extremely unlikely to do much in terms of brand awareness and volume sales.  It feels like they’ve come to the party a little late - there are several other festivals that they should also be at, but I know that those festivals sorted their cider pouring deals a long time ago.  So let that be a lesson to y’all - get your offers in with promoters sooner rather than later!  Given that most of the smaller festivals are probably on 1yr deals, Kopparberg would do well to start conversations for 2009.

So Kopparberg should be putting added emphasis on the other activities they are doing - The Singles Club and The Privilige Card, and the emphasis here is on supporting new music (is there enough differentiation to the Gaymers Grassroots Gigs?  Who is doing it better?)

The Singles Club launches this month and will be releasing three double A-side singles throughout the summer.  The singles will feature tracks from six emerging talents, produced as a ltd edition 7″, and also available for download. 

The Privilige Card will give holders free or discounted entry to a number of club nights across Scotland (???) throughout the summer, and will be entered into a prize draw to win a pair of Connect tickets. 

This seems a bit underwhelming to be honest - they could probably have done far more by linking up with someone like Rough Trade Records and doing co-promotions; the association with probably the best known indy record brand would have given them kudos in emerging talent, and they could extend the brand across the Rough Trade retail network, customer database etc, and do some branded tours etc etc.

(from Rich) 

Avid MySpace users will have noticed that site has had some major changes over the last couple weeks. Gone is the clunky unsightly interface now replaced with, dare I say it, a more Facebook style look. Tom Anderson everybody’s first friend and MySpace co-founder has revealed that it is just the first change in a massive roll-out over the next four weeks.

As MySpace has become a first port of call for brands to connect with their audience online this is interesting news. Will there be the same opportunity to get promotional clips, trailers and profiles featured? By the looks of the new homepage it looks like the answer is NO. However watch this space over the next four weeks for updates.

(from Rich) 

Channel 4’s new programme ‘Year Dot’ is using digital media and music in its promotion to great effect. The idea of the programme is that everyone has defining years in their life that really changed them and altered their life. The programme follows a group of fifteen young people as they embark on what is hoped to be a defining year in their life.

On June 30^th, prior to the TV broadcast, they’ll be continuously updating their stories through blogs, messages and videos, inviting people to give them advice and share their own experiences. It’ll be a unique experiment to witness the transitions they’re going through and the conversations they’re having with their social networks.

A series of established musicians will also be submitting their stories which will be profiled on the official MySpace

A UGC element exists as well with fans asked to submit stories of their own defining years, with the winner being made into a short film.

Here’s an interesting read on the BBC site looking at Gaymers Cider, Tuborg lager and Brothers Cider using festivals to establish brand awareness and all that jazz.

Seems that Nokia is sponsoring Kylie’s European tour, which to be honest is quite surprising; I thought the days of big brands sponsoring single artist tours were pretty much over.

I can’t imagine that European tour and marketing rights for an artist like Kylie are particularly cheap, and given the added cost of amplification across a number of different markets, it’s all adding up.  And I can’t quite see the return.

At a stretch it would be more worthwhile for a network brand, as there is a much bigger customer base; comm’s can be crafted to suit different customer segments, and there would probably be the opportunity to get some money out of different handset brands in each market as a contribution.

But for a handset manufacturer to spend what is almost certainly a vast amount seems a little crazy, given that it is probably going to be a fairly narrow customer segment buying into the tour and surrounding excitement (doubt you’ll get that many SME’s or young fashion concious males that love new technology etc etc.)

Kylie’s probably doing alright out of it though; aside from the cash fee she’s getting a massive contribution to Europe-wide tour publicity and album promotion as well, as customers will be able to download her latest album to the 5310 handset (what about all the other Nokia customers that just re-signed contracts and have a different handset?)

The onslaught of beer and music continues with no let up, despite the fact that I’m even less likely to be able to afford to buy a house this year thanks to the bleeding credit crunch - actually, hold that - what better way to drown my sorrows than with a pint of San Miguel…..

So, San Miguel has announced that last years Hidden Depths programme (I didn’t see it either) will return with five one-off music and media events in London and Manchester.  Each event will be curated by a different host, but full details of who will appear won’t be announced until the night, which means one of two things - either they haven’t got a clue who to book, and/or the nights will be half-full of industry and artist friends as joe public probably can’t be bothered to turn up to a random night.

Tuborg lager has teamed up with Vice Magazine to run a summer comp to send a Vice reader out on assignment to some UK festivals, with the winner keeping a diary of the experience to go on a blog.

This isn’t a particularly original comp unfortunately; it feels incredibly similar to the Carling Postcard series of TV shows from last year, which were infinately better.  It also doesn’t seem to be of massive relevance to the Vice brand/readership - not sure how many of them will be interested in going to Wireless???

Following recent brand interest in comedy, London is set to have a new comedy event this year courtesy of Pimm’s, that most-English of drinks!

Pimm’s Summerfest will be taking place over five evenings at the end of August in Holland Park, London - a venue that usually hosts opera events, and is therefore pretty impressive. 

In terms of timings and brand synergy you’d be hard placed to think of a better link-up.  Pimm’s has always been a sociable summer drink, despite efforts to position it as an all-year-round tipple, and the link with comedy has always been there with their Harry character (currently back on screens and in print).  And what could be more Pimm’s than sharing an evening of comedy with friends in a great (and slightly posh) location?  Timings wise, this will also give fresh momentum to the brand which should help keep it in peoples minds at the end of summer, as long as they amplify it properly.

Following on from a previous post about my definition of luxury, I had an experience this morning that’s had me thinking about the whole idea of ‘luxury’ all day and I thought you might be interested.  (read more here:)

The summer of 2008 will see another addition to the branded one-day ‘festivals’ taking place in London.  Alongside Innocent and Ben & Jerries comes the Subway Picnic Rocks event, taking place on Clapham Common on 5th July.

The line-up includes The Holloways, The Metros and Amy MacDonald and with tickets priced £14.50 I’m sure it won’t be a sell-out, given that most of the Clapham-ites will be in Ibiza.

Whilst it ticks all the right boxes - central location full of loaded young people just itching to hang out on the Common; a charity connection with Action Against Hunger and a compelling sales mechanic (you get a 6″ sub with the ticket price) - this kind of leaves me cold.

I remember sitting on the Common in the past when events have been going on, like the Bacardi gig and the Ben & Jerries show, and thinking “hmm, £15…thats a few pints in my favourite beer garden” and not moving from my spot.

So what I’m getting at is that this doesn’t really have any real relevance other than its summer and everyone else is doing a festival or music event of some kind.

What I’d like to see more of is blatant product placement like in Happy Gilmore with Adam Sandler!