It's Better Down the Pub starts trade push

Point of sale material for the It’s Better Down the Pub campaign, which has a budget of c£150,000, is to be sent to pubs owned by Punch, Enterprise, Admiral, Star Pubs & Bars, Fuller’s and Everards, with more than 7,000 in total. It will be advertised on hoardings at series cricket and rugby matches being shown live on Sky.

A student competition for the campaign will be launched at universities nationwide in September. It will sponsor the Good Beer Guide and will have a presence at next week’s Great British Beer Festival.

A second competition is being launched, linked to the Campaign for Real Ale (CAMRA)/Pubaid, which will focus on raising money for good causes in pubs. Daily prizes will be given out and weekly, main prize will remain iPad, digital cameras and camcorders.

So far the campaign has more than 700 likes and the Twitter account has more than 1,000 followers.

Activity to date includes four consumer launches in Birkenhead (Admiral), Leicester (Everards), Stafford (BII) and London (Fullers), plus coverage in Sky preview magazine and BII magazine.

There’s been an agreement by companies to promote the campaign via Facebook, Twitter, websites, and customer databases. And they have contributed employees to the small steering group that includes the BII, Britvic, CAMRA, Christies, Fuller’s, Gamestec, Heineken, Matthew Clark and Venners.

Initial support for the campaign came from Admiral, BII, Everards, Fuller’s, Pub is the Hub and the Society of Independent Brewers, which offered financial support plus prices, man hours and help via their communications channels.

The second tranche includes Britvic, CAMRA, Christies, Diageo, Gamestec, Heineken, the Independent Family Brewers of Britain, Matthew Clark, Poppleston Allen, Sky, Stonegate and Venners. The third includes AB InBev, the Association of Licensed Multiple Retailers, the British Beer & Pub Association, Carlsberg, Cask Marque, CGA, Enterprise, Intertain, Mitchells & Butlers, Pub Aid, Punch Taverns, Spirit, Star Pubs & Bars, Thwaites, plus trade media including M&C Report and the Publican’s Morning Advertiser.