Camden Hells: The power of media to scale 

Camden Town Brewery (CTB) was founded in 2010 by Jasper Cuppaidge, with the vision of making ‘great beer available to all’. Due to the growth in the craft beer market, CTB was acquired in 2015 by ABInBev with ambitions to scale up the business. As Sir John Hegarty (one of the original investors in the brewery) said: “At some point every brand that wishes to lead has to be willing to broadcast its fame and reputation.”

CTB started working with their agencies Electric Glue and The Garage Soho in order to accelerate the next stage of the journey. In 2017, their aim was to become ‘the UK’s favourite lager’ which meant just not getting bigger but retaining brand love. Their objectives were to grow awareness by 50% whilst retaining brand love at a high 80%. 

The challenge for CTB was how to achieve that tricky balance of acting small but being big.

With this ‘call to scale’ in mind, Electric Glue created a first ever partnership with the ITV Growth Fund, which allowed them a presence in London with budgets they could afford. They knew that by advertising on TV for the first time, they could significantly raise awareness of the brand and encourage people to try it.

However, with the principle of ‘acting small’ in mind, the TV schedule focussed on ‘craft’ programming in which to showcase the creative.

They ran 5 second teaser spots before launching with an advertising break take-over of the first commercial break of the first episode of the new series of Cold Feet on ITV. It was headed by a two-minute commercial, a film that was a celebration of Camden - its history, its people, its style - and showcased what was so brilliant, unique and exciting about the area. It was voiced by local actor Ashley Zhangazha. This was followed by three (of four in total) different 30 second ads that featured real people from Camden who best typified the diverse and unconventional spirit with which the borough of Camden is known, inviting viewers to ‘Raise Hells’. The campaign ran exclusively on ITV for four weeks in September 2017.

Alongside the TV campaign, there was activity on social media, posters, press, cinema and VoD.

The campaign was so successful that CTB could not keep up with the demand and had to limit supplies. In addition, there were significant increases in brand metrics when comparing people who had seen the campaign to those who hadn’t for example:

A brand for me – from 22% to 55%

A brand I like – from 30% to 57%

A brand I respect – from 34% to 61%

A brand I would recommend – from 82% to 90%.       Source: Camden Town Tracking (base: all adults)