Brothers readies first TV campaign

Brothers Cider is to launch its first television advertising campaign this summer as it looks to build on recent sales gains and a widening distribution network.

The cider brand intends to spend £2m on TV activity across digital and terrestrial channels this year. An outdoor campaign including six sheet and washroom posters sited near to points of purchase will support the activity.

Matthew Langley, marketing manager for Brothers, says the brand’s 50% sales growth last year and the increased national retail listings this year means the brand has a “solid platform and critical mass to compete in the television advertising arena”.

He adds that the cider sector can “achieve its best sales ever this year” but only “those that take an aggressive and positive approach to supporting their brands”.

Bothers Cider is the third biggest cider advertiser in the country behind Magners owner C&C Group and Scottish & Newcastle’s Strongbow. Magners is currently preparing a May campaign for its pear variant while Strongbow recently renewed its sponsorship deal with radio station Talksport.

Brothers will start work on the ads in May. Langley says it has yet to appoint an agency to handle the creative account but and is looking to work with agencies on a project by project basis. Media planning and buying will be handled by The Point.

The summer activity follows the poster campaign Brothers launched in the run up to Christmas last year using the strapline “You can’t choose your family, but you can choose your Brothers”.

Brother originated at the Glastonbury Festival in the mid nineties, where it was sold until it was launched as a consumer product in 2006. It recently relaunched its festival edition, a more potent version of the cider, with new label graphics and outer packaging designed by Brandopus.

Recommended

Decline in marketing spend slows

Marketing Week

The decline in marketing spend slowed in the first quarter of 2009, according to the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA), latest Bellwether survey. The net balance of the marketing professionals surveyed reporting an increase in the first three months of the year was -34%, still the second steepest decline in the survey’s nine-year history […]

Marketers must resist pressure to cut ad spend

Marketing Week

The customer is always right. That principle is taught in marketing kindergarten. But right now, the customer is angry about the recession, corporate mismanagement and financial crises and they’re looking for someone to blame. In the US, people are putting pressure on brands over their marketing, especially those companies that have received government bailouts. Sixty-nine […]

FMCG worries add to mixed ad spend outlook for 2009

Marketing Week

FMCG brands – the biggest spending global advertisers – remain the hardest to attract to digital, despite the IAB this week announcing online ad spend in 2008 rose 17.1% to £3.3bn. The report from the IAB, in partnership with PricewaterhouseCoopers and the World Advertising Research Centre, found that online had increased its share of total […]