Title	BECK’S SOUNDPILS
Brand	BECK'S
Product/Service	BECK'S PILS
Category	A01. Food & Drink
Entrant	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY Munich, GERMANY
Idea Creation	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY Munich, GERMANY
Media Placement	CARAT Hamburg, GERMANY
PR	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY Munich, GERMANY
Production	ELEMENT E FILMPRODUKTION Hamburg, GERMANY
Production 2	EXTREME MUSIK Berlin, GERMANY
Additional Company	PLAN.NET Munich, GERMANY

Name	Company	Position
Alexander Schill	SERVICEPLAN GROUP	Global Chief Creative Officer
Markus Kremer	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Managing Partner
Thomas Heyen	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Managing Partner
Lars Holling	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Management Supervisor
Sabrina Schwartz	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Senior Account Manager
Mariah Kattmann	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Junior Account Manager
Sebastien Stabenau	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Design Director
Jan-Erik Scheibner	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Senior Copywriter
Melis Adiguezel	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Copywriter
Sine Hansen	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Art Director
Joy Chakravorty	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Copywriter
Sudarshan Waghmare	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Art Director
Nils-Christian Sperlin	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Final Art Specialist
Philipp Truebiger	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Junior Art Director
Ronnie Patt	SERVICEPLAN GERMANY	Creative Director Art
Jeffrey Lisk	Freelance	Director
Bernd Possardt	Freelance	Director
Sebastian Schroeer	Element E	Producer
Patrick Volm-Dettenbach	Element E	Head of Production
Bernd T. Hoefflin	Element E	Produzent
Christoph Koehler	Neverest	Managing Director
Madeliene Pfisterer	Neverest	Production Assistent
Chris McKissick	Freelance	DoP

Why is this work relevant for Direct?

Beer ads in Germany are mainly about one thing: the beer itself. Beck’s decided to turn the tables and set stage for the ones that actually make beer legendary: the consumers. We set up an outdoor live-stunt that encouraged direct audio-visual interaction with a key element of the brand– its ingredient! A cabin was connected to giant loudspeakers in the world’s biggest hop field, enabling fans to be part in the making of a new beer. People talked around-the-clock and received their footage instantly by mail. Eventually, the harvested hop was turned into a limited edition and sent to participants.

Background

Since 2017, Beck’s revolves around the rallying cry “You make it legendary”. This basically means putting the brand’s most differentiating ingredient in focus: its consumers. Following that principle, Beck’s wanted to create several experiential brand experiences involving fans all over Germany. With soundpils, we wanted Beck’s fans to interact with the brand in a way they’ve never done before – giving the possibility to leave their own mark on a new product and connecting real-life experiences with it. All of this eventually needed to merge into a real, straight to stores, limited edition, available on- and offline – to once again emphasize Beck’s innovative and experiential approach to engaging its exploring target group in direct ways.

Describe the creative idea

Since 1873, Beck’s has been brewing its worldwide known pils with nothing but the finest ingredients: hop, malt and yeast. A quality procedure that is standardized in Germany, because of the purity law from 1516, which legally forbids to use any other ingredients than the named ones for brewing. So, when we wanted to underline the brand’s campaign slogan “You make it legendary” with a direct activation that allows fans to actually become an ingredient of the beer, we faced a problem. We looked at science and found a generally known fact: Plants grow better when you talk to them. This applies to our hop as well! So, we put theory to practise and invited our fans to a real-life experiment that eventually lead to a real Beck’s product with a new and refined taste – and dozens of stories and voices behind it.

Describe the strategy

Freedom is a core value of the Beck’s brand. But in order to regain meaningfulness and relevancy in its target group, Beck’s had to redefine freedom – by making it tangible and experienceable. For this purpose, we needed to turn a traditional TVC brand into a non-traditional online entertainment brand. The new role of Beck’s: encourage millennials to make choices without fearing the consequences. Or in short: Go ahead, don’t be afraid and show the world what’s possible – because “You make it legendary”. A credo that calls for real-life participation, creating and doing. The strategy was translated into interactive ideas that put the consumer first and the beer second, showing everyone that “great moments without you, simply aren’t great” and of course, that Beck’s without you, is nothing but a beer.

Describe the execution

To realize this idea, Beck’s had to put a scientific theory to best practice and make it scalable. We took a crew of sound system engineers to Hallertau, the world’s biggest hop-planting area, and installed hundreds of speakers in the Beck’s field – with heavy machinery. The result? A festival-like sound installation that infused the hop from every angle for the best possible growing effect without disturbing nature too much. On the other hand, we set up an outdoor installation in Berlin that was both visually and audibly connected to the speakers in South Germany: a mobile, noise-isolated speaker cabin with live-recording function.

List the results

The idea resulted in a three-minute documentary that created 29 million social media contacts and has been viewed more than 8 million times in only two weeks, driving engagement on the Beck’s Facebook and Instagram channels. The video itself, despite its three-minute length, has been viewed 2.17 minutes on average with 27 % of the audience watching all of the documentary. But most importantly: we created a whole new, real product, in which the consumer became key ingredient. The Beck’s soundpils hop has been harvested and brewed into a beer with provable, refreshing new aroma. Bottles have been sold in major cities all over Germany. Last but not least, we sent a sixpack-mailing to almost every participant and instantly mailed them their “sound act” video footage by mail.