Challenge:

Find a new story for Heineken that delivers the biggest audience conversation during the world’s most talked about annual sporting event – the UEFA Champions League (UCL), watched by 1.2billion viewers globally.

Strategy:

Disrupt the regular match day social and media chatter, by igniting fan conversation with the premise: how far would you go to get to one of the world’s biggest football games?

Execution:

We created the world’s first media ‘Heist’, actively preventing a group of global media from getting to the Champion’s League Semi Final in order to deliver a conversation about how far they would go to get to the game.

We deliberately set up some of the world’s most influential media to face a catalogue of ‘set-backs’.

Using over 40 actors, two suspect policemen, five different modes of transport and a fake wedding – we immersed the media and their followers in one epic experience.

As the clock ticked towards kick off the influencers had to use all their resourcefulness to get back on track to the Final.

Fans were able to follow in real-time. Our influencers even leaned on their audience to guide their decision making; ‘what’s my talent’ or ‘am I qualified to marry her?’

Outcome:

• 56m Unique Users reached on match-day (25% of the total audience engaged in the match)

• 1.2m views of Heineken’s ‘Road to the Final’ advert in the hours before kick-off

• 75% share of voice vs other UCL sponsors

Media from five countries were invited to watch the UCL semi-final between Barcelona and Bayern Munich at Camp Nou.

Heineken hijacked the trip with a series of unexpected ‘predicaments’ designed to prevent them getting to the match on time. Only the media’s resourcefulness would allow them to prevail.

With over 40 actors, two bogus policemen, a fake wedding, plus multiple modes of transport and locations in Barcelona, this epic experience included:

• Thumbing a lift with a travelling circus after the executive coach “broke-down”

• Being arrested by the ‘police’ for not having the correct paperwork

• Participating in a penalty shootout with the ‘police’ in order to negotiate their way out of jail

• Marrying a Russian couple on a beach after their Priest got lost - only to be thanked by the father of the bride with a lift in his speedboat and then helicopter to get them to the match on time

• Total reach on match-day: 56.6 million UU’s

• Match day advert views 1.2 million (You Tube)

• 75% Share of Voice vs other UCL sponsors

• 85% key message penetration through in-depth coverage post-event, embedding links to the TVC, using branded images and footage from the event

• Sentiment amongst the attending media was 100% positive

• Shortlist Magazine (UK) labelled it ‘The Ultimate PR Stunt’

• Football Fancast.com (UK) ‘More Than A Football Game’