Our solution was to facilitate a strategic partnership between Johnnie Walker and high-profile film Entourage. Our campaign was built on the parallels between the journey of the Entourage characters and the ideals upon which the Johnnie Walker brand stands. Johnnie Walker is an icon of personal progress, in the same way the Entourage storyline has always been centered around personal progress and the celebration of achievements, both big and small, along the way.

The campaign launched on April Fools Day 2015 with a special spoof “Johnny Drama Label” bottle design that was distributed to select, high-profile Johnnie Walker and Entourage fans, social influencers and journalists. The gold and black theme carried through to a billboard and print advertising campaign, limited edition secondary packaging sold in-store, and a social responsibility video animation featuring Johnnie Drama.

We brought in Entourage creator Doug Ellin to script an original piece featuring Entourage actor Kevin Dillon (as Johnny Drama) and Jimmy Kimmel. Directed by Entourage co-star Kevin Connolly, the short film extends Johnny Drama's plotline into a dream sequence where he becomes the face of the Johnnie Walker brand.

The three-minute short film was hosted on Johnnie Walker’s YouTube channel and supported by paid digital media. A shorter edit launched in cinema nationwide on May 25 and continued to play before the film throughout the summer theatrical release.

The brand conducted research following the campaign and found that among our spirit drinker target, key campaign videos performed very well, indicating strong breakthrough as both attention grabbing and highly likeable. 71% of our target believed it made the brand more appealing and 70% said it makes them a little to a lot more likely to choose Walker in the future.

The original short and animation had a combined reach of 4+ million people on Facebook alone.