Returnables system for
Heineken Switzerland
New commercial
for
Buckler in Europa
First delivery by Heineken
Duty Free to Turkey
HEINEKEN INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE NO. 34 PAGE 3
The production of a commercial, from the very first brain
storming session to the moment of its first broadcast, is a
time-consuming affair. Certainly when it involves a com
mercial which is going to be used in several countries. The
new commercial for Buckler is the exception to this rule:
the film was ready within six months.
In November 1990 Heineken an
nounced its decision that Buckler
advertising in Europe would be
handled by a network agency: Lin-
tas. As is the case for the Heineken
brand, a multinational advertising
approach was chosen for Buckler. In
December of that year the first talks
were held within the Buckler
European Brand Team (EBT). Under
the leadership of global brand
manager Gert den Hertog, represen
tatives of Heineken's European op
erating companies and export offices
(the Netherlands, France, Spain,
Italy, Greece, Belgium and Switzer
land) prepared a briefing for the
advertising agency. Such a briefing
sets out the characteristic features of
the brand and the message that has to
be put across.
After that, Lintas called a meeting
in Amsterdam between creative
teams from its agencies in Spain,
France and the Netherlands to come
up with proposals. Each team work
ed independently. Of the eight pro
posals, three were ultimately pre
sented to the EBT team. The members
were unanimous: one proposal was
streets ahead of the others.
Tested
The proposal was converted into
the form of 'animaties'. An animatie
is a sort of cartoon which already
contains the voice-over and the
music. The animatie was tested in
Spain, France, Italy and Holland.
The tests brought a positive re
sponse, though there were minor
points of criticism from each coun
try. Almost all of those comments
related to the text and to shots in the
commercial which did not seem logi
cal to local consumers. Gert den
Hertog gives an example: 'A bar in
Holland looks different from one in
Italy or Spain. So you have to take
that clearly into account when shoot
ing the film.' Local factors must also
be borne in mind when filming the
product. The Spanish word for alao-
hol-free ('Sin') should obviously not
be used in a French or Italian version
of the commercial. Ultimately eight
versions of the new commercial
were produced. Sometimes the diffe
rences are hardly noticeable, but for
the film's consistency it is important
that those differences are there.
The French version set the ball
rolling and was aired for the first
time in June. The other countries will
follow this autumn.
Last year Heineken Schweiz, in cooperation with distributor
Distrom S.A., started introducing returnable bottles. One year later
export manager Michel Greeve reports with satisfaction that the
project is successful.
Because of environmental considerations the Swiss government
wanted the importers of beers and soft drinks to change over par
tially to returnable packaging. Besides this, more and more signals
were coming in from the on-premise trade about difficulties in dis
posing of so many bottles.
In response to these signals and to meet the government's wishes
a start was made with 25 cl and 33 cl returnable bottles for the
French-speaking part of the country.
The project is a great success. If keg beer is included, about one-
third of the total sales volume in the French-speaking part of
Switzerland is now sold in multi-trip packaging and Greeve expects
this share to grow further.
Eight months after the initial con
tacts were established, the first lorry
with Heineken beer departed for
Turkey on Tuesday, 17 September.
The Heineken beer is destined for the
duty free market in Turkey and was
delivered to eight duty free shops in
Kapikule (on the border with
Bulgaria) and in Istanbul.
Antimpeks Ltd. is the intermedia
ry for Heineken Duty Free in Turkey.
The total duty free market in Turkey
comprises supplies to ships (via ship
chandlers), embassies and airlines
and to some 160 duty free shops
along the borders with Bulgaria,
Greece, Iran, Iraq and Syria. The
shops are operated by 25 companies.
The transport to Turkey met with
quite a few snags at first. According
to Turkish government regulations
one lorry is only allowed to deliver to
a maximum of three addresses. A
further problem was caused by the
hostilities in Yugoslavia, which
meant that the lorry had to make a
detour to get to Turkey.
The first lorry is loaded with Heine
ken beer for the Turkish duty free
market.
