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12 Jan 2012
Leading British soft drinks manufacturer Britvic, and PepsiCo UK, today unveiled their new cross-brand, cross-channel multi-million pound campaign, which for the first time brings together their total portfolio of leading drinks brands; Robinsons, Pepsi, Tango, 7UP, Fruit Shoot, J2O, Drench, Lipton Ice Tea, Mountain Dew, R Whites and Britvic.
Running for nine months from February to October 2012, ‘Transform Your Patch’ will help transform outdoor spaces nationwide, giving communities more access to outdoor sports, activities and fun. The campaign has been created in partnership with Groundwork, the country’s leading environmental regeneration charity.
It’s simple – every purchase helps transform outdoor spaces.
The campaign is designed to engage consumers and drive sales for retailers and makes it easy for everyone to join in. Every soft drink purchased of any of the participating brands represents a real 1cm² piece of land that will be transformed. It’s a simple way for people around the country to contribute to a long-lasting legacy on their patch.
In the take-home and impulse sectors, key packs across the participating brands will feature an actual 1cm² patch to represent the 1cm² of land that will be transformed, alongside the ‘Transform Your Patch’ logo.
There are four types of transformation project; each matched to appeal to the interests of the different brand’s core consumers to drive relevance and engagement.
Transforming spaces and lives
Simply by buying a participating soft drink, consumers will be helping to provide viable, safe and easily accessible spaces where communities can socialise together, exercise, stay healthy and enjoy a sense of well-being – all crucial ingredients for a better and stronger society.
Working with Groundwork, the UK’s leading environmental regeneration charity, Britvic has identified around 165 exciting projects of various sizes to be transformed. These will be distributed evenly across the 11 regions of Great Britain* to ensure as many people and parts of the country benefit. The type and scale of transformation will vary by project and is only decided after significant community liaison and due diligence, ensuring that local people have a real voice in deciding where the investment goes.
A thirst for change
Simon Litherland, GB Managing Director of Britvic Soft Drinks commented: ‘Transform Your Patch’ can be truly transformational for Britvic this year. From skateparks to picnic areas, not only will it help transform the visibility and credibility of our brands in a highly competitive market, but more importantly ‘Transform Your Patch’ will bring people together, fuelling social change and helping local communities create a lasting legacy they own. This is what makes this a truly inspiring programme that we feel proud to be part of.”
Sir Tony Hawkhead, Chief Executive of Groundwork added: “It’s encouraging that major brands are taking their role within communities seriously. We’re thrilled to be partnering with Britvic Soft Drinks and PepsiCo UK to deliver the ‘Transform Your Patch’ campaign this year. Our charity’s goal is to create real sustainable change for the future on a local, regional and national level. With this is mind, we’ve carefully selected 165 projects matching the interests and the needs of communities across the length and breadth of Great Britain so as many people as possible benefit from the investment behind the ‘Transform Your Patch’ campaign. We look forward to sharing the projects successes this time next year.”
Engaging the nation
Consumers only need to buy a drink to participate with ‘Transform Your Patch’, but there are many opportunities to get more involved. Within each of the 11 regions, four shortlisted projects have been selected to potentially receive additional investment giving people the opportunity to vote for the project they think is most deserving. This will create 11 up-scaled projects around Great Britain that will receive a “super-sized” level of transformation. In addition, the three runner up projects in each region will all still receive their original planned investment.
The ‘Transform Your Patch’ campaign will also be supported by a heavyweight marketing plan including TV (which will feature the portfolio of brands together for the first time), national and local radio, digital and social media, a major print media partnership, celebrity ambassadors and PR. The campaign will launch from February and communications will drive consumers to a dedicated online community forum where they can view transformation footage, vote on projects, read messages from celebrities and volunteer for local initiatives.
Capitalising on the 2012 opportunity
Jonathan Gatward, GB Marketing Director, Britvic Soft Drinks comments: “With 70%** of people agreeing that brands should do more for local communities and with 2012 being such a unique year for large-scale events that are all about bringing communities together, we know that this is the right time to offer the nation something to get involved in. By partnering with our trade customers, ‘Transform Your Patch’ will reach and engage people in communities across the country, helping to drive soft drink sales while leaving a positive legacy that will endure beyond 2012.”
Amanda Thomson, Marketing Director PepsiCo UK, said: “‘Transform Your Patch’ has the power to make a real difference to communities throughout the country. By working with Groundwork to transform outdoor spaces, we will create more opportunities for people to get outside and enjoy themselves, be it to meet friends for a picnic or kick a football around. The Pepsi Max brand has a long association with football and it’s great to deliver a campaign that will not only boost sales but also give people access to brand new 5-a-side facilities”.
Partnering with the trade to strengthen community relations
Enabling stronger community relations with shoppers is viewed by many retailers across the grocery and impulse trade as critical to growth and long term sustainability. With 68%* of shoppers believing that local retailers play an important role in local communities, second only to schools, Britvic believes ‘Transform Your Patch’ will perfectly complement the needs of it’s trade partners.
In Grocery outlets ‘Transform Your Patch’ will be communicated to shoppers at the point of purchase via a range of retail media including high impact in-store shippers and POS materials that promote ‘Transform Your Patch’ and the corresponding brands. This will be supported by cross-brand price promotions allowing Britvic to feature multiple brands together in-store, increasing the reach of the campaign while continuing to offer great value and choice for shoppers. Britvic will also be running a number of tailored initiatives in partnership with retailers’ own community programmes to ensure they offer added value for shoppers. Activation in store will kick off in February to align with the national media campaign
In the Impulse sector, convenience retailers sit at the heart of their communities so being able to support the ‘Transform Your Patch’ campaign provides a great opportunity to strengthen this relationship further. To enable this, the ‘Transform Your Patch’ website will feature a trade-facing area where retailers can download POS, locate their nearest local project and explore ideas to drive soft drinks sales during the 2012 calendar. In 2012 Britvic is also proud to partner with the Federation of Wholesale Distributor’s (FWD) ‘My Shop is Your Shop’ campaign to help educate wholesalers and retailers of the benefits of community engagement, with commercially focussed advice as well as bespoke ‘local’ solutions for outlets in close proximity to ‘Transform your Patch’ projects.
In addition, to ensure that shoppers see the campaign in as many outlets as possible across the convenience and impulse sector, Britvic will deploy heavyweight POS, a range of semi-permanent display solutions, price marked packs and cross-brand promotional deals. These will be activated via its own regional sales force and in partnership with key wholesale and retail partners starting from February to ensure alignment with the national media campaign.
*11 ‘Transform Your Patch’ Regions: Scotland North West England North East England Yorkshire & Humberside Wales West Midlands East Midlands Eastern England London South East England South West England
**Source: PCP Market Research, 2011
For further press information, please contact: Clare Littlejohn, Britvic Soft Drinks Press Office on 01245 261 871 / clare.littlejohn@britvic.co.uk or one of the Publicasity team on 01442 261199 / britvic@publicasity.co.uk
For Groundwork UK, contact Chris Burton on 0121 237 5874 / christopher.burton@groundwork.org.uk
All reader enquiries should be directed to: Customer Services, Britvic Soft Drinks on 08457581781
