The agency won the business following a multi-agency pitch; the account size is pegged at around Rs 25 crore.
After a pitch that was called earlier this year, Denmark-based global beer maker, Carlsberg has awarded its creative mandate to Percept H. About four agencies were eyeing the account. While no official comment was forthcoming, a senior source has confirmed the development to afaqs!.
The account, pegged to be around Rs 25 crore, will be handled out of the Delhi branch of the agency. Carlsberg’s media mandate lies with MPG.
The creative duties of the brand were hitherto looked after jointly by an agency called Bounds and Carlsberg’s in-house team. However, since Carlsberg is getting increasingly active in India, it opted for a larger agency to strengthen the brand’s positioning in the premium space, where it competes against other international brands such as Corona and Hoegaarden.
Carlsberg’s brand portfolio includes Carlsberg (super premium mild beer), Palone (premium strong beer) and Tuborg (premium mild). Recently, the company also launched Tuborg Strong, a strong beer targeted at tier II cities.
Advertising in the category is a challenging task in India, because the country is one among others such as Ukraine, Kenya, France and Norway, which have banned alcohol advertising on television and billboards.
In such a situation, ATL is not a priority and brands rely heavily on consumer engagement opportunities, apart from using surrogate advertising, either physical (the brand promotes other products, such as mineral water) or virtual (the brand gets associated with events and activations).
Carlsberg entered India in 2006 by forming a company named South Asia Breweries, via a joint venture between Carlsberg Group and associated companies. In 2009, the name was changed to Carlsberg India.
The company, which had set up four state of the art breweries in India, recently announced the opening of its fifth brewery in Andhra Pradesh.
