Pepsi, Beyonce to launch $50 Million campaign

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PepsiIt will be timed with the pop star’s next album and even includes a limited edition Pepsi can with Beyonce’s image. The effort will include TV spots and a multimillion-dollar fund to support the singer’s chosen creative projects. Sometime after she performs at the Super Bowl halftime show on Feb. 3 (also sponsored by Pepsi), Beyoncé will appear in a new TV ad — her fifth for the soft drink since 2002 — and her face will be on a limited-edition line of soda cans.


For Pepsi, the goal is to enhance its reputation with consumers by acting as something of an artistic patron instead of simply paying for celebrity endorsements, reports the New York Times.

“Consumers are seeking a much greater authenticity in marketing from the brands they love,” Brad Jakeman, president of PepsiCo’s global beverage group, told the paper. “It’s caused a shift in the way we think about deals with artists, from a transactional deal to a mutually beneficial collaboration.”

The multiyear campaign is estimated at $50 million, the bulk of it for media placements and promotions around the world, and the remainder split roughly equally between Beyoncé’s fee and what Pepsi calls a creative content development fund.

In addition to the commercial, via 180 LA, TBWA/Chiat/Day Los Angeles and Organic, all part of the Omnicom Group, the deal will involve sponsorship of Beyonce’s world tour next year.

All the standard sponsorship elements will be present on the tour, like prominent Pepsi logos. That kind of marketing, Jakeman said, is “still important, but insufficient” to reach savvy young consumers. So Pepsi will also play a role in selecting local talent as opening acts at various points around the world.

See the NY Times story here

RBR-TVBR observation: Let’s face it—soft drink sales are bombing as of late, in favor of Red Bull, sweet tea, bottled water and the like. The old days of showing soda is refreshing are over—they just aren’t that refreshing. Showing an icon drinking the product is pretty played, so this may be the way to go—integrate the product into an icon’s music, career and life in general and people may go out and buy some.