At the beginning of the season the Las Vegas Golden Knights were given the worst odds in history to win the championship. This team was the laughing stock of the sporting world and journalists predicted that anything better than a last place finish would be a miracle. We took real audio of all these critics doubting the team and overlaid it with footage of the city coming together around the team throughout the season. Our key visual was something true to the sports betting capital of the world: a gambling odds board. We showed how the team’s odds dropped throughout the year as they kept winning and made history.

Every decision made during the development of this campaign was made with the city and fans of Las Vegas in mind. We filmed our video throughout different areas of the city and showed how fans of all shapes, sizes and ages rallied together to support this team. We found moments of newfound direhards, like fans lining up to get tattoos of the team’s logo. We saw all the city’s iconic landmarks fully decorated in the team’s colors. Since this was the city’s first professional sports team ever we wanted to document a city transformed after the worst day in their lives. We didn’t need to force scenes to happen or arrange for actors to feed us lines. All we had to do was show up in the city with a camera and watch the magic happen.

The energy was highest during the week of the championship games. We edited our video in real time as the seven game series played out in the city. Unfortunately, the Golden Knights’ magical run came to an end and they lost their chance to raise the trophy. But this wasn’t about raising a trophy. It was about lifting a city. We knew we needed to release our film quickly to join the conversation and do our part to give the people of Las Vegas something to commemorate an incredible first season. The morning after the championship game ended our video was released online exclusively in the city of Las Vegas. There was no national media spend for this campaign.

Our film quickly gained traction across all of the city’s news channels. And despite only releasing online in Las Vegas, a city of less than 1MM people, the film received national attention in the media, garnering 40MM PR impressions across the U.S. Fans throughout the city came out online to thank us for making a video that captured what it meant to be a Knight’s fan when no one else was giving their city a chance. For us these comments from the community were the most impressive result of this campaign. It proved to us that this story was helping the city heal and that sports have the unique power to shape culture. Although the film barely features our product at all, in the month following the release Budweiser sales in Las Vegas saw a 7 point increase, outperforming all sales trends for the brand nationally.