Four Roses Launches First Ever UK Ad Campaign: ‘Don’t Mention It’

£400,000 Multi-Media Spend Targets Drinkers in London and Manchester

Four Roses bourbon has launched its first-ever consumer advertising campaign, targeting a younger whiskey drinker, with a range of support for on-trade stockists across the UK.

Commissioned and co-ordinated by the brand’s long-term distributor, Spirit Cartel, the £400,000 digital outdoor and social media campaign is entitled ‘Don’t Mention It’. 

The work is initially focused on the country’s two bourbon-selling hotspots, London and Manchester. As part of the spend, further, national, work is planned in early 2024. This will also take the brand into a wider variety of media, with enhanced stockist support.

The campaign kicked off with the reveal of a 7m spray-painted wall in Shoreditch – which was subsequently mock ‘vandalised’ in order to hide the brand name, creating intrigue and piquing interest from passers-by. The covering-up effect – playing on the idea of letting people discover (and keep) a best-kept secret for themselves – is being replicated across all digital executions.

The unexpected and intriguing style of the campaign and its executions are designed to drive curiosity, spark a sense of ‘discovery’ and stand in stark contrast to imagery more commonly used by Scottish and Irish whiskies. Spirit Cartel’s research revealed an appetite amongst younger bourbon drinkers for discovering ‘hidden gems’ in the category – such as Four Roses, which is actually in its 135^th year.

Support executions display complimentary comments about Four Roses from on-trade outlets and aficionados such as the British Bourbon Society – again, with the brand name covered, but similarly designed to drive drinkers to their sites, whether bricks and mortar, or online.

Jane Bulankina, Head of Marketing at Spirit Cartel, said: “We’ve managed to build a strong and knowledgeable base of core drinkers for Four Roses. Now the time’s right to speak to a wider, younger, audience – drinkers that like to discover things for themselves and want to be the first amongst their peers to do so. This eye-catching campaign enables just that and is part of our broader work to demonstrate bourbon’s classic, yet relevant, appeal. The profile we’re giving it will encourage more drinkers into the category – and, with bourbon’s mixability and complexity, they’re likely to remain in it.”

Source: Spirit Cartel

  Alcohol, Beverage, Campaign, Digital Outdoor, Four Roses, Four Roses Bourbon, London, Manchester, Marketing, Spirit Cartel, UK, whiskey