The Edrington Group is one of the world’s leading whisky producers. This week it selected PR agency Inkling to help promote its Cutty Sark brand to consumers in their 20s and 30s.

It’s too early to know what Inkling might do with the Cutty Sark brand. But there’s no doubt it will be a lively campaign if Edrington’s marketing support for its other whiskies is anything to go by. The best example of this is the company’s work with The Famous Grouse, a market-leading Scottish Whisky that was introduced by Matthew Gloag in the late Nineteenth Century.

Key to the success of The Famous Grouse is the way Edrington has managed to stay true to the brand’s heritage without limiting its appeal to younger consumers or the international market. It has, for example, entered the fast-growing pre-mixed market, introducing whisky & cola cans into leading supermarkets. It also introduced a brand extension called The Black Grouse, designed to financially support the RSPB’s bird conservation activities.

Burns supper campaign

In 2010, The Marketing Society’s Scottish division recognised the quality of Edrington’s PR work when it awarded the company a PR Excellence Award for a campaign entitled The World Famous Burns Supper Campaign. Budgeted at £50,000, this was a smart campaign, which took advantage of the fact that 2009 was the 250th anniversary of the birth of iconic Scottish poet Robbie Burns and also the year of Homecoming Scotland; a new event designed to entice people of Scottish descent to visit the old country.

Working with the organisers of Homecoming Scotland, Edrington’s Famous Grouse agreed to sponsor and organise The World Famous Burns Supper on January 24th/25th of that year. It then called on consumers and organisations around the world to get involved online. The ultimate aim was to create “the World’s Most Famous and Virtual Burns Supper and to toast the famous bard with the famous bird”. In other words, it offered the brand a platform that blended Scottish heritage with global reach.

Focal point

The focal point of the campaign, and one of the most important pieces of the global execution, was the creation of 250 Limited Edition bottles of Famous Grouse Blended Malt. Scottish artist and writer John Byrne painted a new image of Robert Burns for the bottle and a competition was held to find the best toast. This was then printed on the back label of the limited edition bottle.

The six-month PR campaign associated with the event reached over 140 countries, delivered an ROI of over 12:1 and donated over £70,000 to charities all over the world. Outside the UK, it also spawned activity in territories such as Canada, Russia and Brazil.

Outcomes

In terms of exposure, the campaign achieved the following:

• 33,000 people from 140 countries visited the website.

• Over 100 pieces of coverage were generated in the UK alone across national and regional print media, TV and radio. Further coverage was also generated across Canada, Russia and Brazil.

• Broadcast coverage was secured with CNN, Alan Titchmarsh’s Daytime Show and Something for The Weekend (BBC2).

• Requests for Limited Edition bottles came from 21 countries. All 250 bottles were issued raising £70,100 for charitable causes.

What can we expect from the Cutty Sark campaign?

Like The Famous Grouse, Cutty Sark is an international brand. It doesn’t have a strong Scottish heritage like The Famous Grouse but it does have a clear brand heritage. So expect a brand campaign that has an adventurous (maybe nautical) feel to it. Cutty Sark brand controller Jason R. Craig seems to confirm this line of thought when he says: “PR is an essential element of the brand’s global comms strategy. This partnership will bring to life the spirit of adventure that our brand represents and we look forward to a long and mutually beneficial partnership”.

Note: While Scotland’s individual whisky brands vie with each other for market share, there’s also a realisation that they have a common goal in maintaining Scotland’s status as the world’s pre-eminent producer of whisky (apologies to the US and Ireland). A recent study from Verso Economics estimates that Scotch whisky is worth £4 billion a year in added value to the Scottish economy. The industry´s annual turnover in Scotland is £6.4bn and, after oil and gas, whisky remains the country´s leading manufactured export, with shipments of £3.1bn a year. Spending with Scottish suppliers, helps support 35,000 Scottish jobs, with the industry itself directly employing 10,300 people across the country.