Treasury Wine Estates (TWE) has extended its use of Augmented Reality (AR) technology to cover its Lindeman’s Gentleman’s Collection brand.

Following the success of the 19 Crimes Augmented Reality app, Gentleman’s Collection, which launched in 2015 and is widely stocked across UK grocery and convenience, has now been equipped with the same innovative AR technology.

Scanning the front label of the Gentleman’s Collection bottle with a smartphone or tablet will load a ‘Gentleman’s Guide to Augmented Reality’, as told by Dr Henry Lindeman himself, the founder of the Lindeman’s winery.

And with a nod to this new innovation and the success of the 19 Crimes AR experience, TWE has now launched a new app which will bring all of its AR technology “under one roof”. The ‘Living Wine Labels’ app, which is now available in the app store, will host all brand experiences for Gentleman’s Collection and 19 Crimes.

The 19 Crimes app has enjoyed significant success since it launched in October 2017, with over 20,000 people downloading the app in the UK alone and it being used by over 150,000 people.

The launch of the technology for the Gentleman’s Collection range will be supported by on-pack communication – all bottles will have an on-pack sticker, while the back label copy will inform consumers at the point of purchase about the AR and app. And, of course, Gentleman’s Collection will now visible on the new Living Wine Labels app

UK shopper marketing support will focus on promoting the AR technology in Father’s Day activation. For example, Nisa will be supporting it with an online campaign and in-store gift bags, while across Asda there will a sampling campaign as well as in-store gift bags.

From a consumer perspective, the brand will use lifestyle influencers in the UK to leverage its reach and introduce Gentleman’s Collection and its AR technology to a new audience; this will be further supported by a series of paid social media posts.

Kirstie McCosh, Marketing Director, Europe, says: “Following the huge success of the same activity with our 19 Crimes brand we are very excited to unveil the addition of Augmented Reality to Gentleman’s Collection. It brings another dimension to the shopper experience with Gentleman’s Collection – becoming a further talking point to share and enjoy with friends. From an in-store perspective, Augmented Reality elevates Gentleman’s Collection’s presence, appealing to and engaging consumers with an interactive opportunity.”

The ‘Living Wine Labels’ app is globally available and will host the relevant brands in specific markets. In Europe, the focus will be 19 Crimes and Gentleman’s Collection.

Treasury Wine Estates (TWE) is one of the world’s largest wine companies, with a portfolio which includes Penfolds, Lindemann’s, Wolf Blass, Beringer, Gabbiano and Greg Norman Estates. TWE is focused on portfolio premiumisation and brand-led marketing and its wine is sold in more than 70 countries around the world.

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Treasury Wine Estates (TWE) has unveiled the latest product in its Male Millennial wine range, “The Banished”, and added an Augmented Reality app for its 19 Crimes range as it looks to drive popularity with males aged 18 to 34.

“The Banished” is a dark red blend, produced using extra tannin extract, which TWE says leaves a taste with enhanced darker fruits and dark chocolate notes on the finish. It is the latest addition to TWE’s 19 Crimes portfolio – the 19 crimes referring to the various offences which could lead to people being transported for life to Australia during Victorian times.

Each of the wines in the range features a different real Victorian who suffered transportation for life on its label. “The Banished” features James Wilson, a convict who was found guilty of treason in the 19th Century for involvement with the Irish Fenian movement and sent to Australia, although he later escaped to America.

With the launch of “The Banished”, TWE is now making a big push in the run up to Hallowe’en. 19 Crimes will be supported in retail over the coming weeks with a neck collar promotion which features a new 19 Crimes app, which uses Augmented Reality (AR) technology. The app brings to life two of 19 Crimes’ criminals-turned-colonists. Hovering a mobile hand-held device (e.g. mobile phone or tablet) over the bottles will bring the character on the label to life, sharing their stories of rule-breaking that sent them across the ocean to Australia.

TWE says Male Millennial wines are one of the growing success stories in the wine sector. Kantar recently outlined a significant gap in wine consumption amongst men aged between 18-34, with their insights showing that only 34.4% of Male Millennials drank wine purchased in the off-trade each month, the lowest of any demographic group.

In the 12 months leading up to July 15^th this year, the Male Millennial segment has shown 95% value growth, and TWE claims that 19 Crimes is performing extremely well.

Since its launch in the UK in 2015, the brand has grown significantly with latest figures showing the brand enjoying a 86% year on year value growth in total off-trade in the 12 months up to July 15^th, while in grocery it has a rate of sale over four time higher that of its nearest competitor. At the same time, it has added significant value to the overall wine category, with an average price of over £7 a bottle.

Tom King, Managing Director, TWE Europe, says: “This is a very exciting time for the 19 Crimes brand. The latest market insights show that there is strong demand for our wines amongst this very important market segment. So it is a perfect time to launch “The Banished” in the UK, a wine that perfectly targets our core consumers.”

King adds: “We are also hugely excited by the launch of our Augmented Reality app across the whole 19 Crimes range. Our insight clearly shows that millennials like brands with real and authentic stories and our AR innovation brings the 19 Crimes story to life. There is nothing else like it out there in the market and you really have to try it to see how good it is. It speaks directly to our target consumer and is yet another string to the bow of this fantastic brand.”

19 Crimes is currently the wine sponsor of the London Craft Beer Festival – a series of three consumer Craft Beer events that are taking place across the UK this summer – namely in Edinburgh, London and Bristol. At each event, the brand has an active presence with both the Red Blend and “The Banished” served at the “Barrel and Wheel”, a bespoke wine bar, which matches the wines with a selection of cheeses.

Treasury Wine Estates (TWE) is one of the world’s largest wine companies, with a portfolio which includes Penfolds, Lindemann’s, Wolf Blass, Beringer, Gabbiano and Greg Norman Estates. TWE is focused on portfolio premiumisation and brand-led marketing and its wine is sold in more than 70 countries around the world.

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Malibu, the world’s no.1 coconut flavoured rum, has launched Internet of Things enabled bottles into Tesco in the UK on an exclusive basis. Consumers with smartphones just have to tap the image of a ‘Malibu sunset’ on the bottles to access content and be able to enter prize draws instantly.

The 40,000 ‘connected’ Malibu bottles use Near Field Communications (NFC) chips, similar to the ones found in Transport for London’s Oyster cards and many credit and debit cards. Malibu points out that by using NFC chips, there is no need for consumers to download an app to their phone.

The campaign is part of the worldwide Malibu #Becausesummer campaign.

Pernod Ricard UK, which owns and markets Malibu, says that its exclusive research has revealed a growing trend in consumer demand for “experiences not products, whereby consumers are no longer buying products and services – they are buying experiences delivered via the products and services. By changing the dynamics and challenging traditional views, brands can significantly increase their engagement with new and existing consumers and, the more innovative the approach, the more chance of reaching a new audience. Malibu has responded to this consumer need by introducing the ‘connected’ bottles technology.”

The campaign has been developed through an on-going partnership between Malibu and creative agency SharpEnd, and follows work undertaken at The Absolut Company’s innovation lab in Stockholm, where Absolut and Malibu collaborated on a ‘connected’ bottles showcase. The project has now led to the very first pilot of this kind in the UK.

Embracing the technology, Malibu will be turning each bottle into a direct, digital touchpoint for consumers. ‘Tapping’ the iconic sunset logo on the Malibu bottle will open up a world of five amazing digital #Becausesummer experiences that consumers can access through their mobile browser, including:

• Instant-win competition – tap to win UE Boom speakers
• User-generated-content competition – consumers are encouraged to upload a summer snap. Google’s Cloud Vision API will then use its automated machine learning capabilities to recognise the content of the image and classify it into a theme (e.g. BBQ, Festival, Beach). Once classified, a personalised, branded image is sent back to the consumer.  They are then entered into a prize draw to win a holiday to Barbados (7 nights all-inclusive)
• Bartender in a bottle – drinks recipes
• Bar locator – uses the consumer’s geo-location to find the nearest Malibu bar and alfresco drinking spots if the weather is good
• Playlist – connects to Malibu Play on digital audio streaming platform Mixcloud for playlists from Groove Armada, Marvin Humes, Clean Bandit and more.

There is an age-gate to access prizes and content, only users aged 18+ can access these experiences.

Jo Alexander, Malibu Marketing Manager at Pernod Ricard UK, comments: “This is a huge step into an exciting future for the alcohol sector, and part of our on-going push for Malibu in the digital space. We couldn’t be more excited that Malibu is leading the way in brand innovation by bringing this advanced technology to the forefront of the industry. This concept is consistent with our ‘Because Summer’ wider campaign as we wanted to ensure that our target audience of young-adult fun starters could get the most out of summer – and our ‘connected’ bottles do just that with a number of exclusive prizes on offer at the tap of a bottle. As a first for Malibu, we know that this will be a huge hit with consumers and we can’t wait to see their reactions. This is just the beginning for this exciting new technology.”

Cameron Worth, Founder of SharpEnd, comments: “Bottles are now media platforms, able to drive localised content that is defined by the market that sells the product and maintains the consumer relationship. Once the bottle becomes a media platform there are so many different things that can be delivered that are beneficial to shoppers. This provides an entirely new way to communicate with them and brings Malibu directly in front of its target audience, presenting the opportunity to drive brand loyalty through service delivery.”

Tomas Roope, Creative Lead, ZOO Google Creative Services EMEA, adds: “We are hugely excited about being part of bringing such a complex suite of technologies together, to build such a simple, user friendly bridge between packaging, mobile and shoppers’ passion for self-expression. For us this is a really intriguing exploration of something that only a few years ago would have been prohibitively complex technically. For us this really feels right on the edge of user retail innovation.”

The ‘connected’ bottles will be in-store from the beginning of September; all bottles will have an accompanying neck-tag to provide the consumer with a clear explanation of the technology.

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