Guinness

1.0 Company History

Guinness is part of the global Diageo business. Diageo was formed in 1997 through the merger of GrandMet and Guinness. Their main business is the premium drink market. Seagrams was added to the portfolio in 2000.

Diageo possess the broadest and most recognized collection of premium drinks brands. Their brands include Guinness, Smirnoff, Baileys, Johnnie Walker and Gordon’s. Diageo provide a lot of information about its vision, marketing and brands on www.diageo.com which should be a key source for your research.

Guinness is one of Diageo’s priority brands. It is the number 1 stout in the world, brewed to suit local tastes in 50 countries and sold in more than 150. For more information on the brand you can download the attachment.

The Guinness website www.guinness.com provides more information on the history of the brand, examples of TV, poster and press advertising over the years and much more. It is also the hub of all the current online marketing to the existing Relationship Marketing consumers.

2.0 The Marketplace

Guinness is GB’s fifth largest beer - 1 million pints sold every day in the UK.

Guinness considers itself to be within the broader “beer” category, not restricting itself to the specific “stout” category within which it holds an effective monopoly. Its main competitors by volume are the likes of Fosters, Carling, Carlsberg, Stella Artois and John Smiths.

The most widely distributed beer brand in this country – Guinness Draught has a 90% distribution around Great Britain, compared with other leading lagers which have distributions of around 40%. This means that, unlike the competitors, Guinness cannot increase its market share by increasing its distribution. Instead Guinness relies on increasing consumption of the beer within the existing outlets by increasing the number of occasions on which Guinness can be drunk at the expense of the other beers in the consumer’s repertoire.

3.0 Guinness Customers and the Database

GUINNESS Relationship Marketing Programme (GNS RM programme)
The Guinness relationship marketing programme aims to:
 drive both affinity to the brand AND consumption increase through increased share of repertoire
 motivate top consumers to switch to Guinness in more of their drinking occasions
Achieve this by engaging Guinness drinkers in a relationship with a brand and product they love

Key Challenge for Guinness RM:

In an environment where effective communication with our consumers is an increasing challenge, how can we use the RM programme to motivate existing Adopters to increase their consumption of Guinness?

The Drinker Journey
At recruitment to the RM programme each consumer needs to answer an affinity statement about how they feel about Guinness
 E.g. ‘It’s the only brand of beer I drink’ - Adorer

Their chosen statement plots them on the ‘Drinker Journey’
 From Rejecters to Adorers of the brand

At each stage in the Drinker Journey consumers experience different triggers and barriers to consumption occasions when they drink Guinness. Barriers may include the time it takes to pour a Guinness or that it is not a drink for a high-energy occasion.

Understanding this enables us to tailor communications and enable us to overcome these barriers.

Ultimately we aim to drive consumers up the Drinker Journey to become Adorers of Guinness and maintain and grow those at the top end of the scale

We know there is a positive correlation between affinity and consumption

See Appendix 5 for Drinker Journey diagram.

Brand Affinity
Consumers are segmented based on their response to an affinity question:

Adorers – It’s the only brand of beer I drink
Adopters – It’s one of my favourites, along with others
Acceptors – It’s not a brand I tend to drink, but every now and again I may have one
Available – I’ve heard of this brand but it is not one that I know much about
Rejecter – I have not heard of this brand, nor do I want to

The greatest potential to drive share of the customer's repertoire lies with the Adopter group who have a taste for Guinness, but don’t consider it their regular tipple. Opting instead to drink it at special Guinness occasions (St Patrick’s Day, Rugby matches, Christmas etc). Therefore they are considered to have a low Share of Repertoire (SOR) – i.e., they drink more of other brands than they do of Guinness. Their consumption of Guinness can then be increased by cannibalizing other brands volumes in their drinking repertoire.

Consumption
Consumption is positively correlated with affinity. The following are the average consumptions of the two main groups in the on- and off-trade:

Adorer – 4 pints GD per week, 2 cans GDIC per week
Adopter – 1 pints GD per week, 0.25 cans GDIC per week (note that the “Objective” is based upon consumption per month – you will need to include a conversion ratio in your calculations) If an Adopter’s consumption level reaches or exceeds the Adorer average, they will be automatically upgraded to Adorer status. The converse is also true, with on average 10% of Adorers making the step down each year through natural attrition.

Geodemographics
Predominantly male (90%), Legal Drinking Age (LDA) to 55 years of age. Split into two core groups:

“Up for its” – Younger, unattached blokes; always up for a night out with the boys, and would always prefer a pint or two down the local with the boys watching sport than staying at home.

“Family focused” – Over 35 years old and settling down; probably owns a house and has a young family. Still loves to get out to the pub, but on much lower energy occasions, and much less frequently. Far more likely to spend Saturday night in with the family, perhaps having a can of Guinness in front of a good film.

4.1 The Guinness Database
The database is held by an external database specialist agency. They handle all data feeds coming in through the year, plus any extract that the RM agency request. All new recruits are automatically qualified and their details uploaded. Any extract can be made from the base using the various fields below.

Database Fields
Title
Name
DOB – Integral to responsible marketing; there are no names of anyone under 18 years
Postal Address
Postcode
Brand Affinity [Adorer, Adopter, Acceptor, Available, Rejecter]
Guinness consumption – Off Trade [0-14 cans per week]
Other beer consumption – Off trade [0-14 cans/bottles per week]
Guinness consumption – On Trade [0-14 pints per week]
Other beer consumption – On trade [0-14 pints per week]
Sport Preference [Football, Rugby, None]
Demographic Split [Up for it, Family Focused]
Email address (20% of consumers on the database have a valid email address)

On-Pack – All 18- and 12-packs of GDIC carry recruitment question questionnaires which are often incentivised – approx 2,500 consumers per month qualify

www.guinness.com - Approx 1,000 consumers a month qualify through filling out the form online

Events – There is usually some form of recruitment from field marketing teams at major Guinness events (London Irish home games, Cheltenham Festival, London Boat Show)

Cold and warm list recruitment – A number of profiled lists have been used to recruit, but none are scheduled for this year.

4.0 The Guinness Brand

Guinness is famous for its dark colour, creamy head and unique surge and settle. The two-step
119.5 second pour process is integral to the brand.

Brand personality – If Guinness were a person:
A regular bloke in his thirties, but a bit of an individual who knows his own mind & has his feet irmly on the ground
He goes out with his mates but isn’t a wild party animal. Approachable, laid back & easygoing, he’s not into badges or showing off. He hopes to lead a balanced life & doesn’t waste much time on trivial fears
James Nesbitt (from Cold Feet)

Tone of Voice: Irish sense of craic, sociable, down to earth/genuine. Guinness speaks as you would expect your well-informed mate to do down the local.

Sponsorship
Guinness sponsors a number of teams and events in order to drive association of the beer with certain target markets:

SkySports – Guinness is the only sponsor of all Rugby Union coverage on Sky Sports and SkySports.com
British Lions – Guinness will sponsor the British Lions tour of New Zealand
London Irish – Guinness is the principal sponsor of the Zurich Premiership Rugby club
Celtic League – Guinness sponsor this league for Welsh, Irish and Scottish Rugby Union sides
Cheltenham Gold Cup – There is always a Guinness village at this prestigious horse racing meeting
Boat Show – Guinness holds a presence at the yearly boat show in London

Whilst the sponsorship costs are from a different cost centre and needn’t be included in your budgets, all of these can be considered assets that can be exploited for RM activity.

Whereas the majority of sponsorship spend is on the core sports association – Rugby Union – it is important to remember 60% of RM members have expressed an interest in football too.

Associated Guinness assets

Guinness Webstore (www.guinness-webstore.com) - is the online shop for all Guinness merchandise (they can be used to source widgets for mailings, or prizes for competitions) – take prices for these incentives direct from the website.

Guinness Storehouse (www.guinnessstorehouse.com ) - is the incredible visitor centre based at the home of Guinness, St James’ Gate Brewery, Dublin. Again, this asset can be used for prizes and incentives if desired.

6.0 Product
History
At the age of 27 Arthur Guinness used his inheritance of £100 to buy a 9000 year lease on a rundown brewery in Dublin (St James Gate)

At this time there were 200 breweries in Ireland, 10 of which were on St James Street, Dublin, all fighting to use the one guaranteed supply of pure water

Arthur battled against the Dublin Corporation for 12 years to win the rights to precious water

Originally he brewed both ale and a newer black beer called porter

By 1799 porter had become so popular that Arthur focused all his brewing on it and by 1821 he had perfected the brew for “GUINNESS Extra Superior Porter”

By the end of the 19th century the business had expanded into foreign markets and was launched on the London stock exchange

The Guinness dynasty founded by Arthur controlled the brewery for 227 years

Product Variants

Guinness Draught - launched in 1959.
Mixed gas of Nitrogen and Carbon Dioxide to give the surge and the creamy smooth head
Available in Extra Cold (chilled to 2ºC less than regular Guinness) or Regular
It takes 119.5 seconds to pour the perfect pint

Guinness Draught in a Can - launched in 1988
A new can design has just been launched which makes GDIC smoother and creamier than before
The widget won the Queen’s Award for Technological Advancement in 1991

Guinness Original
Stronger in taste and strength and longer matured than Guinness Draught
The original Guinness perfected by Arthur Guinness

Guinness Foreign Extra Stout
First launched in 1802 as West Indies Porter
Strongest in taste and alcohol

Market
Strong markets for GUINNESS Draught are:
GB, Ireland, USA

Strong markets for GUINNESS Foreign Extra are:
Africa (Nigeria), Caribbean

Only consider the GB market for this brief.

7.0 Current marketing activity which should be taken into account for this brief.

7.1 Sales Channels
The Guinness market is split into two broad areas:

On-trade – All licensed establishments for the selling and consumption of alcohol on-premises. E.g. Pubs, Nightclubs, Clubhouses, Bars etc. The principal Guinness variant sold here is Guinness Draught (GD) and Guinness Draught Extra Cold (GDEC)

Off-trade – All licensed shops that sell alcohol for consumption off the premises. E.g. Off licences, Supermarkets etc. The principal Guinness variant sold here is Guinness Draught in Cans (GDIC), and to a lesser degree Guinness Original (GO), and Guinness Foreign Extra Stout (FES)

For the purposes of this brief, Guinness want to specifically focus on GD and GDEC in the ontrade, and only GDIC in the off-trade.