Newcastle Beer Picks on Stella Artois by David Brbaklic

There is the campaign, the anti-campaign and something in between. While the first is intended to promote a brand, the second is created with the same intention, but is based on pointing out competitor brand’s flaws through explicitly mentioning the brand’s trademark entities such as the name, slogan, etc. Let’s just say the latter is forbidden in advertising business and can lead to serious trouble. That’s why most companies that decide to take the road of mocking their competitors usually pick the “in between” option –  taking something that is highly characteristic of the competitor brand, but isn’t registered to legally belong to them. For example, that’s how Samsung created the “Next Big Thing Is Already Here” campaign focusing on the hype that can unmistakably be connected to its main competitor Apple iPhone and all the prejudice that accompanies it.

Now, we have Newcastle, a British based Brown Ale brewery, taking a little different approach. Droga5, the agency that was appointed by Newcastle, decided to pick on Stella Artois by exploiting the word “Chalice” used on Stella’s most recent print ads that have “It’s a chalice, not a glass” written on them. The Newcastle billboard just says “Who uses the word ‘Chalice’?”, and is placed under the Stella Artois billboard. At the bottom of the pint ad “No bollocks” phrase is written to point out that beer commercials are usually created to convey nonsense messages.

Photo: adweek.com

According to a Droga5 spokesperson:

Newcastle’s heritage, its founder, hometown and brewing process are all fair game. It’s beer advertising without all the bollocks that usually comes with beer advertising.

Three commercials were created as a part of this mild. Take a look, and tell us what you think about them in the comment area below:

Personally, I think the commercials are more ingenious than the print ad itself, and convey just the right message. Could this be a start of an always interesting advertising war between the two brands? Or will Stella just find Newcastle a barking dog that never bites? Only time will tell.