During 2020 Italy was hit by the fist wave of Covid-19, this involved a country-wide quarantine and strict measures of social distancing. For this reason Absolut Italy, the “Mixing People” brand for excellence, decided to take a stand during this critical situation by launching with the italian fashion brand MSGM, a rainbow limited edition: Absolut #bettertogether. “Nothing makes sense when we're apart”, the message sent by the brand, conveyed the idea that people, standing together, are stronger and can defeat any difficulty. The inclusive and engaging activation was launched during the Pride month to reinforce the brand commitment and support towards the LGBTQ+ community and part of revenues were donated to a local charity entity by offering meals to those most in needs.Objectives: 1. Create excitement around the brand 2. Show support to the whole country

By choosing 100 between influencers and journalists the idea was to engage the audience with some organic contents creating a sense of togetherness amongst Absolut’s community. The press kit, fully recyclable,contained a Limited Edition bottle and an MSGM facemask. The hope was to raise awareness on the importance of facemask, at a time when many people thought it wasn't necessary to avoid the spread of the virus.

Additionally Absolut chose a powerful message (Nothing Makes Sense When We're Apart) split in two to gain the curiosity of the audience. The colors of the bottles' hoodies were the colours of the rainbow as a clear reference to the LGBTQ+ community, which is very dear to the brand.

The insight behind the campaign was that Italians needed to receive a strong message of hope to make it through the first wave of COVID-19 at the era of social distancing. The message “Nothing makes sense when we’re apart” aimed to achieve exactly that, creating a sense of hope and togetherness amongst its community whilst social distancing. To create concretely the sense of togetherness and solidarity Absolut organized a donation to a local charity entity to support people most in need, through the sales of the limited edition. The target is 18-44 identified as Progressive Connectors. They’re indeed young people who are passionate on togetherness, proactive with an inner desire to connect themselves with the world, always respecting it. The assets created for the PR launch were developed internally at Absolut Italy, including the press kit. For the distribution instead, Absolut was supported by a PR agency

Absolut Italy launched the #bettertogether Pride 2020 campaign with 20.000 bottles.

A multichannel media strategy and data driven planning was created: the digital/social campaigns worked on creating awareness and get maximum visibility; the huge activation on PR and Influencers has created a strong storytelling, engagement and have supported the maximization of sales and creation of bespoken contents.

The OOH, with a maxi-wall on a premium placement in Milan’s nightlife city center, planned after the end of the quarantine, achieving the goal to be close and visible to the community.

A single print half page on the first Italian newspaper was planned to push on the universal message of #bettertogether.

Timeline: July -August 2020

Scale: National

The partnership with MSGM allowed Absolut to communicate its values to a wider audience. Moreover, Absolut supported a local charity entity through the donation of part of its revenues. The value created by the brand consists in the sense of hope and togetherness conveyed during the pandemic. Due to social distancing, people couldn’t be together however Absolut brought its community closer to each other on an emotional level rather than a physical one. Total Reach: 11M.

Sold out in 1 month; +28.4% value vs last year; E-commerce: +24% on total volumes sold vs 0.5% average, +371% on Absolut volumes vs same period last year. Other KPIs: Donations +143K meals, site traffic: +25K views in 1 month, 56’’ ATS vs benchmark 10’

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