Coors Light and TSN are gearing up for “The Coors Light Games” — a competition designed to celebrate and promote amateur sports. Really, really amateur sports.
The Games, slated to take place in Ontario this August (the exact location is being kept under wraps for now) will see Canadians from coast-to-coast compete in a variety of “backyard sports,” including bubble soccer, giant Jenga, volley pong and more.
Described by the brand as “an epic two-day tournament of really, really, really amateur sports,” the Games are Coors Light’s biggest initiative — from both a budget and complexity standpoint — in the last three years. The effort aims to inject some fun into the brand, and keeps the focus squarely on millennials, a strategy the brand has been implementing since shifting the brand assignment from Leo Burnett to Rethink in October without a review.
According to Alistair Senn, marketing manager for Coors Light, the Games target “the type of drinkers who are spending their summers creating highlight reel moments and then sharing them with their friends in an epic battle of who can have the best summer.”
“As Canadians we spend 6-8 months of the year huddled up inside away from the cold, and we’re probably the only nation catching up with friends on the patio at 10 degrees as soon as spring hits,” Senn told Marketing.
“We knew that as Coors Light has spent the past four months starting to re-position itself that we needed something that would appeal to our younger consumers, something that they would want to share with their friends on social and content that was relevant and meaningful to them,” he said.
In honour of the Games, TSN has created an editorial-based program called “Summer Centre” that will cover all aspects of the tournament, and will be hosted by TSN Sportscentre reporter Cabbie Richards and Beatrice Bouchard, twin sister of professional tennis player Eugenie Bouchard. The partnership also includes support from TSN’s Quebec arm, RDS, with Phil Branch taking on hosting duties for Quebec. The alliance with TSN began last fall, when the brand teamed up with the network for the TSN Fantasy Football League Manager Powered by Coors Light.
To qualify for the national event, the brand will be hosting smaller competitions in Calgary, Montreal, Vancouver and Ottawa, and through a mobile tour making stops in Montreal, London, Ottawa and Kitchener throughout the summer.
The brand has also hidden nine Gold Cans amongst specially-marked Coors Light packs. Those who find a can win a ticket to the August event, along with round-trip airfare if they hail from outside Ontario.
Coors Light is supporting the program with TV spots, digital, social and integrated programing through TSN and RDS. Behaviour developed the concept, MEC is responsible for the media buy, and Harbinger, along with Molson’s internal team, is handling PR.
