Michelob Ultra launched a high profile marketing push around Super Bowl LVI at the start of February called ‘Superior Bowl’ which features NFL legend Peyton Manning and tennis super star Serena Williams and champions gender equality.
The campaign is led by a hero ‘Superior Bowl’ commercial, includes an appearance by Williams in a live game-day broadcast integration and includes no less than three spots running during the Big Game to promote its core light beer, its pure gold organic lager and its hard seltzer.
During the integration Williams will wear a Superior Bowl-themed bomber jacket from Michelob Ultra’s new ‘Spare Clothes Collection’ which will be released on 13 February (Super Bowl Sunday), while another game day element of the campaign will include a ‘get-home-safe’ spot starring Manning that will air on digital and social platforms.
All of the spots are set in the brand’s ‘Superior Bowl’ venue; a vintage bowling alley which attracts multiple celebrity clients and is ‘managed’ by actor Steve Buscemi (an actor associated with The Big Lebowski’ in which Buscemi played a bowling partner to Jeff Bridges’ lead) and described as being ‘where the players play when they’re not playing.
The central 60-second ‘Welcome To Superior Bowl’ spot, which dropped on 8 February, sees athlete ambassadors Peyton Manning, Alex Morgan, Jimmy Butler, Nneka Ogwumike and Brooks Koepka engage in spirited competition – only to have their bowling contest dramatically interrupted by the arrival of Serena Williams.
The ad and its accompanying supporting social content all seek to drive viewers online to learn more at www.MichelobULTRA.com where they can watch the films, play the campaign game, buy the merchandise, join the team and find out more about Serena vs Peyton.
A second commercial called ‘Caddy’ focuses on golfer Koepka and Michelob Ultra Organic Seltzer, while the final ad called ‘Golden’ will air in select markets and see musician Becky G choose Michelob Ultra Pure Gold.
The Michelob Ultra ad series was developed with agency Wieden + Kennedy New York and directed by Rachel Morrison.
The campaign sees Michelob Ultra emphasize an even gender split of celebrity ambassadors – a move which fits with the brand’s recent $100m pledge to increase the visibility of women in sports – and its recent partnership with Women’s Sport Foundation. Indeed, the Anheuser-Busch brand recently signed a five-year contract with the Women’s Sports Foundation to assist female athletes vying to participate in elite competitions, adding a cause marketing component to the star-studded campaign.
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The scale of the campaign reflects how the brand’s star – coupled with its sporting credentials – has risen in NFL brewing partner’s Anheuser-Busch’s portfolio. After all, the label is the fastest-growing beer brand in the US by market share and the No 2 selling beer based on volume sales.
Parent company Anheuser-Busch will also run spots for pillar beer brand Budweiser, Bud Light Seltzer Hard Soda, a new zero-carb beer Bud Light Next and for its Cutwater Spirits sub-brand.
In total, the brewing giant, a longtime NFL sponsor, is running four minutes of national ads for various brands on Sunday after taking a lower key approach to 2021’s Big Game during the teeth of the pandemic when its flagship brand Budweiser sat out of the event for the first time in 37 years to instead focus on promoting COVID-19 vaccines.
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