Guinness

A St. Patrick’s Day to Remember

Guinness champions moderation on the biggest drinking weekend of the year.

The background

St Patrick’s Day is meant to be Ireland’s day of national pride. But for many it had also become a day of great shame. 69% of Irish adults believed that excessive drinking during St. Patrick’s Day celebrations contributed to negative stereotypes about Irish people.

As the brand most associated with St Patrick’s day, Guinness had an opportunity to change the narrative. To encourage people to moderate their drinking and make the most of the weekend.

But persuading people to drink less alcohol and pubs to sell less alcohol would not be easy. We needed to find a way to do it that matched the spirit of the occasion and the DNA of the brand: power, goodness and communion.

Whilst ‘responsible drinking’ campaigns often deploy shock tactics or serious tones, we wanted to present moderation as a positive choice, making Guinness 0.0% beer the hero of the campaign.

The idea

With Guinness 0.0% you can ‘Make it a St. Patrick’s Day to Remember’.

Drawing inspiration from the social media trend of “singing pints” – achieved by blowing the creamy head of a pint of Guinness – the film features a choir of Guinness 0.0% pints singing along to the soundtrack of Bonnie Tyler’s Holding Out For A Hero.

Using pints rather than people, the film celebrates the communion that makes St. Patrick’s Day so special and reminds people that they don’t need to drink alcohol to have a good time.

The results

It was truly a St. Patrick’s Day to remember for Guinness and for Ireland.

With 2.5 million impressions, the campaign reached more than half of the population of Ireland.

Over 100,000 pints of Guinness 0.0% were enjoyed across the country on St. Patrick’s weekend – the highest non-alcohol sales period in the brand’s history.

Orders of Guinness 0.0% kegs increased by 160% and 150 more pubs decided to carry Guinness 0.0% permanently vs before the campaign. But the impact went far beyond pubs and bars. There was a 50% increase in Guinness 0.0% sales in supermarkets. And a 412% increase in Guinness 0.0% volumes in the Aviva during the weekend, where Ireland played England in a key Six Nations match.

Pride in ordering a non-alcoholic drink on St. Patrick’s Day rose by 8%, Guinness 0.0% became the most talked about non-alcoholic beer in Ireland and social media mentions rose by 74%, with #Guinness00 the number 3 trending hashtag after #StPatricksDay and #Ireland.