Heineken believes that crossing borders enables people to get the most out of life - but could experiences make legends of any object?

Heineken created a series of posters that are more than just posters - each one with its own legendary experience to tell. They collaborated with 40 Legends from the worlds of sport, entertainment and art, to engage with as wide an audience as possible - Heineken lovers and the collaborators’ fans.

All to raise money and awareness for Reporters Without Borders, a non-profit who champion the freedom of information and assist journalists seeking out stories that need to be told.

The key objective of the Poster design was to create something that people would want to put on their walls, and therefore bid for. Each Legendary Poster began life exactly the same, featuring an image of the iconic green and red Heineken bottle, each one screen-printed by hand. The simple design meant that the physical evidence of their Legendary experiences were highlighted. Whether they’d deep-dived 60m in the ocean, spent a night with a French actress, been tagged and patterned, or got burnt on a volcano - their battle scars were there for all to see.

The key challenge was to find the right collaborators. We wanted a strong mix from the worlds of sport, entertainment and art, Legends in their fields, in order to engage with as wide an audience as possible - Heineken lovers and the Legendary Posters collaborators’ fans - through earned media and our events.

We also had to ensure that the Posters’ stories, along with the Posters themselves, were captured in an exciting way as possible, to motivate viewers to bid for them in our online auction.

The Legendary Tumblr site got 255,215 pages visits from 126 countries, with visitors spending 5:20 min on average on the site, and 255 of them bidding for the posters, raising 25,369.75 euros for Reporters Without Borders. Over 2000 people visited the gallery events, and the campaign generated awareness of over 28.5 million earned media views.

Creative Review's - "Ad of the Week"

Creativity - "Editors Pick"

Design Boom - "The epic series coined The Legendary Posters is emblematic of Heineken’s brand message, that crossing borders creatively, professionally and personally enables people to get the most out of life."