The encyclopedia · Advertising & PR · Marketing decision · 2015
Carlsberg built a poster that poured real beer; the world noticed in a day
Fold7 embedded a Carlsberg tap in a Shoreditch poster so the ad served the product; queues formed from midday and coverage ran from The Sun to TIME.
Carlsberg
the move
Carlsberg's long-running 'If Carlsberg did…' platform set an impossibly high bar, so the brand had to deliver an experience that matched the joke.
Fold7 built the world's first beer-serving poster at The Truman Brewery in Shoreditch: a tap and stack of glasses embedded in the panel, free Carlsberg for one day. Early-summer sun turned it into a queue that lasted from midday to evening.
Coverage ran from The Sun, Mirror, Metro, The Telegraph and The Guardian to Time Out, The LAD Bible and TIME, and the campaign won an Epica Award in Outdoor.
why it works
- The medium delivered the promise, so the claim was proven rather than asserted.
- Free beer plus sunshine created a crowd, and a crowd is the most persuasive advertising there is.
- Every pour was an event worth filming, converting a one-day stunt into global earned media.
what transfers
When your brand line is a boast, the strongest proof is experience: let the audience verify the claim themselves, and the resulting crowd and coverage do the advertising.
what came after
The poster became one of the most-loved out-of-home stunts in beer marketing and folded back into the 'If Carlsberg did' series as a benchmark for product-as-media work.
references
- Carlsberg Advertising Campaign: Probably The Best Poster In The World
- Carlsberg Best Poster in the World — campaign details
- Fold7 'Probably The Best Poster In The World' — Epica Awards 2015
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