Nicotine Cocktails

As the cold weather sets in, life is starting to become a drag for many smokers, but there may be an alternative to braving the great outdoors for a puff: nicotine cocktails.


London bars are now serving nicotine and tobacco in cocktail form, but can you really get your fix in a glass? And what would it taste like?

Shochu Lounge on Charlotte Street, London, serves a Smoked Old Fashioned. It is the least hardcore of all the cocktails and doesn't contain any actual nicotine, but it is made with tobacco, smoke and leather essences to give it a smoky flavour. The cocktail's creator, Tony Conigliaro, says it's pretty popular, selling more than 20 a week. He has also noticed a change in people's habits; now that people can't smoke, they are drinking more.

At Floridita on Wardour Street, London, head barman Richard Woods has thrown smokers a lifeline with the 'All Up In Smoke' section on the cocktail menu. A rum based Tobacco Old Fashioned and the Cigar Lover's Martini, both on the menu before the ban, have been joined by the Nicotini, the Smokey Old Fashioned, and the Smoked Agave Sazerac.

If you tend to binge smoke when you're out, you could run into difficulties. These cocktails pack a punch, an Old Fashioned is basically a glass of pure alcohol and at £12.95 a cocktail, there really is an incentive to wait until the cigarette cravings kick in.

On the menu at Pearl Restaurant and Bar in High Holborn, London, is another version the Nicotini cocktail. This is a dark, sweetish drink, made with rum, Kahlua, lemon juice, sugar syrup, egg whites and garnished with orange peel and rosemary. The nicotine comes from the rum, which has had a Cuban cigar in the bottle for a week. Head barman Gustavo Bertolucci says he came up with the cocktail to keep people inside after the ban. "We wanted to take the nicotine out of the air and put it in a glass."

So we wait with baited (fresh) breath to see whether these cocktails really take off and help smokers quit. Keep an eye open when you're next browsing the cocktail menu of a trendy London bar.

Source: The London Paper, Tuesday 23rd October 2007

Smirnoff Text

If you type "smirnoff" into your mobile phone in predictive text format it spells "poisoned".

'Pimms Harry' brought to life using social networks

Pimms have been doing something interesting online things around the central character from their TV advertising - Pimms Harry. There is a website at http://www.anyoneforpimms.com/ and there have been various things running on social networks.

There has been the opportunity to befriend Pimms Harry on Facebook and www.myspace.com/pimmsharry lets you join in with him on Myspace (screen grab below).

Good way to extend TV and radio campaigns and clever way of enhancing brand personality.


I expect to see more of this sort of activity as brands understand more about how social networks can be used creatively in support of advertising.

Posted by http://www.nickburcher.com/.

Green 360 Vodka

Given the enormous tide that is building around the issue of Green this and that the Vodka 360 brand is fascinating. The ad says it all really. Should all of our brands be following suit? Should we be putting an eco plan together?

Drink resonsibly...

Drive responsibly...

Exist responsibly.

From Beverage World:

"Going green has become chic with the launch of 360 Vodka, the world’s first eco-friendly super premium spirit brand. Made with the finest American grain to ensure a silky smooth finish and a unique, state-of-the-art production process, 360 Vodka’s distillation process is 200 percent more efficient than the conventional pot still method. The vodka also is packaged in a striking, crystal-like bottle that’s made from 85 percent recycled glass. Through its “360 Close the Loop” campaign, Earth Friendly Distilling, a division of McCormack Distilling Co., will donate $1 to eco-friendly organizations with every bottle cap returned to the distillery."

This is the tip of the iceberg.

Heineken Beer Brick

From Inhabitat via AdJoke:


"Upcycling is a 21st century term, coined by Cradle to Cradle authors William McDonough and Michael Braungart, but the idea of turning waste into useful products came to life brilliantly in 1963 with the Heineken WOBO (world bottle). Envisioned by beer brewer Alfred Heineken and designed by Dutch architect John Habraken, the “brick that holds beer” was ahead of its ecodesign time, letting beer lovers and builders alike drink and design all in one sitting.

Mr. Heineken’s idea came after a visit to the Caribbean where he saw two problems: beaches littered with bottles and a lack of affordable building materials. The WOBO became his vision to solve both the recycling and housing challenges that he had witnessed on the islands.

The final WOBO design came in two sizes - 350 and 500 mm versions that were meant to lay horizontally, interlock and layout in the same manner as ‘brick and mortar’ construction. One production run in 1963 yielded 100,000 bottles some of which were used to build a small shed on Mr. Heineken’s estate in Noordwijk, Netherlands. One of the construction challenges “was to find a way in which corners and openings could be made without cutting bottles,” said Mr. Habraken.

Despite the success of the first “world bottle” project, the Heineken brewery didn’t support the WOBO and the idea stalled. Interest was reignited in 1975 when Martin Pawley published Garbage Housing which included the chapter ‘WOBO: a new kind of message in a bottle.’ Heineken once again approached Habraken who teamed up with designer Rinus van den Berg and designed a building with oil drums for columns, Volkswagen bus tops for roof and the WOBO bottles for walls, but the structure was never built.

Today, the shed at the Heineken estate and a wall made of WOBO at the Heineken Museum in Amsterdam are the only structures where the ‘beer brick’ was used. As to the remaining WOBO’s it’s not clear how many exist, or where, but the idea, even some four decades later, remains a lasting example in end-use innovation."

We should develop bottles that have a life after their contents have been guzzled. We can't keep throwing glass away. Maybe the idea we had a while ago for refil packs could work?

Branston Baked Beans

Branston are giving students loans in the form of 24 packs of their Baked Beans to start their university terms off.

This cleverly targeted activity aimed fairly and squarely at students is brilliant and has generated a great deal of PR because it is of genuine relevance, use and interest to students. What's more it's also disarmingly surprising and therefore fits in with Russell Davies' theory of being:

Useful



Surprising



Interesting



From Beyond Baked Beans:

"According to a report in yesterday's Times food manufacturer Branston is introducing a baked beans loan scheme. Students will receive free cans and pay for them once they start work.

Cases of 24 tins will be delivered by Branston - a relatively new entrant to the bean market - to participating students, every term for the next three years. They will defer the interest-free payment of £105.84, at today’s prices, until the students start work.

Apparently sales of baked beans in student households are down 20% in the last five years with students developing more sophisticated tastes - such as the Thai Green Curry posted today. That's also roughly the period this site has been in existence so who knows, maybe we started the trend!

Anyway if you want to take advantage of the offer - and why not - you should email branstonbeanloans@premierfoods.co.uk. Apparently you have to settle the loan by the end of your first year of paid employment though whether Branston is going to employ a vast staff of debt collectors to enforce that seems highly unlikely."

Nick has made the following observations about why this idea is so good:

1. The idea is well targeted, and shows a really well defined business and consumer challenge. A clear ‘X’ marks the spot.

2. It is disruptive and newsworthy. Yesterday I heard a radio discussion about this launch sandwiched between an article on student debt and the political party conferences. It made ‘headline’ news at virtually no cost. It has been covered on many news programmes and newspapers. I assume that they are communicating on campus and in student-targeted publications too. It got covered not because of the amount of A&P spend, but because it was inventive, surprising, relevant and entertaining.

3. The context and the manner of delivering the message communicates Branston as a big brand, and more importantly (for this brand) a big baked beans brand

4.It is highly relevant to the target audience, and likely to generate discussion amongst them.

5. Every student that takes up the ‘loan’ will try the brand enough times to become a loyalist, and as students usually live with other students are likely to talk about the brand to their friends.

6.Once students have registered for the ‘loan’ Branston will have a database and the right to further communication, which they would not have had if they just gave away the beans.

7. The more obvious approach of just giving away the beans would still have the potential to convert Heinz users, but would not have delivered the talk value (word of mouth or news coverage) and ongoing relationship.

On top of this activity, taste tests have shown that 76% prefered Branstons to Heinz. Heinz are clearly rattled hence their decision to change the recipe for their Beans.

We love the clever targeting and timing and the sheer simplicity of the idea. It's an idea fits with John Grant's Marketing Innovation Manifesto and Alex Wipperfurth's Brand Hijack. What we need are strong interesting ideas that are useful and executed in a surprising way.



Thank you Nick for this.

Bling H2O

Move over Evian, Bling is here!


Just when the word "bling" had finally run its course, along comes Bling H2O. The movers and shakers of the world have chosen this as their preferred drink. This is the most expensive bottled water in the world and celebrities swear by its crisp and fresh taste. It has now become a status symbol for people in the news.

The world’s first super luxury bottled water comes in limited-edition, wine-sized corked frosted bottles embedded with Swarovski crystals spelling out its name. A round or rectangular charm denoting the genuine Swarovski adornments hangs from a bottleneck chain. The bottles of liquid gold can set you back as much as £68 at luxury European hotels and top US night spots.


“Either you bling or you don't bling,” says Bling H2O founder Kevin Boyd, a Hollywood writer-producer. “This is pop culture in a bottle.”

Since its launch in 2006, Bling has turned up at an after-party for the MTV Video Music Awards, in the dressing rooms of the 48th annual Grammy Awards, and at a style lounge for the Emmys, where it was used to give stars facials because of its good 7.3 pH balance. Bling also made the scene at Super Bowl festivities in Miami and at NBA All-Star game happenings in Las Vegas.

The pimped-up bottles come in several color schemes, including one of cobalt blue glass and one with canary yellow crystals. The number one market is France where it is sold in the Louis Vuitton store on the Champs Elysées in Paris.

With flashy bottles, a hefty price tag and genuine crystals, Bling H2O is definitely making its presence felt.

You can find Bling H2O at www.blingh2o.com or take a look at its myspace page www.myspace.com/blingh2o