I Am Canadian

In 1768 A Company Was Born. John Molson started a small company in rural Quebec, that would start a beverage revolution as we know it. Since its inception it has grown into the fifth largest brewer in the world and employs some 3100 Canadians in its six respective breweries. Molson is one of Canada’s oldest brand names and North Americas oldest beer brand. . Award winning brands include Molson Canadian their flagship beer, Molson Export, Molson Dry, Coors Light, Rickards Red and Marca Bavaria under its brand umbrella. They also posses working relationships with premium brands such as Heineken, Corona, Miller Genuine Draft, Fosters Lager, and Creemore Springs. Molson strives daily to maintain its identity, and build an emotional bond with its consumers utilizing marketing campaigns such as “The Rant”

Promotion

In 1994 Molson launched their most successful campaign to date. They played on a strong sense of Canadian identity and decided to build on the fact that up until this point Canadian’s were always mistaken for Americans. Molson devised the term “I Am CANADIAN” to differentiate us from Americans and to embed a sense of national pride while building brand emotion. This campaign turned out to be a success and in March 2000 under direction form MacLaren McCann Advertising in Toronto they launched their next promotion titled “The Rant”. This advertisement produced 8.8 million dollars in free media coverage and boosted their overall market share increased by 2% or 20-27 million dollars in sales for year following. Molson’s stock price increased 1.8% in the following year. The Rant revitalized the Molson brand by creating awareness in 19-29 year olds and single handedly established it self with the non-beer crowd and built a national sense oidentity in their brand. They sold the idea that by consuming their brand the “Average Joe” could party with scantily clad models on patios.

The Rant campaign that debuted during the Oscars after the blame Canada routine in 2000 and was watched by Find out how many people watched Oscars. This campaign produced much controversy after its initial airing. It was unknown wether this was a Pro-Canadian or Anti-American and never made it to air on American networks. Prior to The Rant campaign Molson utilized the tag lines “I AM Canadian” from 1994-1998 and from 1998-2000 to “Here’s where we get Canadian”.

Molson Canadian is a avid sponsor of all things Canadian. Wether it be the Molson Indy, Hockey Night In Canada, KW Oktoberfest or the Molson Canadian Rocks series. Molsons commitment to the community does not stop at just sponsoring events. It offers free bus rides during Oktoberfest to discourage drinking and driving. These events generate millions of dollars in free press but nothing has proved to be as successful as giving away free merchandise. Molson will occationaly include free t-shirts, golf balls and other items in their cases of beer.

Molson play on the carnal need of men to procreate. They launched a campaign where they double labeled bottles of beer with random pick up lines. The Marin Institute deemed these ads deceitful guides to luring women into bed. In a letter that molson received they cited that there is a direct correlation between alcohol and sexual assault. Post reciving this letter molson and its parent company Coors pulled the campaign to stay in line with the institutes codes of conduct. Molson’s intention with these ads was not to promote sexual assault but to take a humorous look at the interaction between males and females while consuming their “social beverage” and connecting the brand to their consumers respective lifestyles. This is not the first time the Molson-Coors family had been citied for poor taste in advertising. In 1997 they showed scantily clad, boxom women consuming beer. This was viewed as a direct attempt to target underaged drinkers.

Molson does not only target its male audience. A recent ad that ran in cosmopolitan showed a man holding a dog and contained the punch line “His Address: The Intersection of Confidence and Compassion. His beer…MOLSON” They also started placing statements on their Canadian bottles Sexy Gals cant Resist Sensitive Guys’ it suggests putting the card in you wallet so you may strike up meaningful conversation with women.

Their latest campaign title “It Starts Here” created by ZIG, their newly appointed marketing agency. This campaign embodies the core characteristics of Molson’s Brand Heritage. The new commercials originally airing in March of 2005 and will take the place of the “I AM Canadian” as their official tagline.

Product

Molson Canadian is now the number 1 consumed beer in Ontario and in the top 5 in the United States. This shows that their marketing initiatives have not been fruitless as demonstrated by consumer response. Molson places emphasis on quality and this is shown by winning a gold in the north American lagers category in 2003. Molson contains 5 percent alcohol and is best described as the classic Canadian lager, with a pleasant hop character, that is fairly light in body and moderate in sweetness. In order to maintain their quality levels molson implemented a quality team that attended multiple events to monitor the overall experience and quality so that their brand identity would not be tarnished. As well Molson places their suppliers thru a rigorous audit to ensure quality all the way up the supply chain. Even after being awarded the “Molson Certified” designation audits follow up every few years.

In the united states there was much confusion between the different molson brands. In 2005 they implemented a unified packaging format so that consumers may be able to identify molson products at a glance. The products affected Molson Canadian, Canadian Light, Molson Golden, Molson Ice. The outcome of this marketing initiative is that molson indubitably had the strongest shelf impact in the category. Since launching the new packaging in the united states molson Canadian sales in its core marketplace which accounts for 62% of their sales increased