Throughout the 80’s and 90’s, over 3 million Peruvians migrated overseas, leaving true friends behind. Pilsen Callao decided to prove that true friendship crosses borders. They did so by flying old friends back home in exchange for collected bottle caps with their “Bring your pal back” campaign.

Pilsen Callao needed an idea that would break through the saturated news clutter and go beyond standard press coverage and paid media.

In Peru, technological innovations are very well received. The goal was to maximize coverage and Free Press by using Peruvian media's thirst for innovation and technology.

Pilsen Callao’s “Bring your pal back” promo encouraged participants to collect kilometers printed under every bottle cap for a chance to bring their friends back home to Peru, no matter where they were.

To boost awareness we offered something they needed -a place to store their caps- and something they wanted. Since we couldn’t very well bring back their friends, we brought back… their heads! We created the first 3D-printed cap-collecting “piggy bank”, personalized with your own friend’s features and voice.

Working from pictures sent by their friends we modeled their heads in 3D with a one-of-a-kind angled style Art Direction that made the gadget unique and desirable. Once “the heads” were modeled, they were created using an industrial 3D printer that gave them color and detail and then continued on to our hack-lab.

Our technicians installed and programmed each system with an infrared sensor to scan the bottle caps, an Arduino toolkit to process and trigger the recorded audio, and a speaker to reproduce the friend’s voice when a cap was inserted.

We transformed the concept of a piggy bank making it fun, techie and friendly, while taking an amazing campaign to new heights in the process: “Talking Heads”.

Groups of friends all over Peru went crazy for the “talking heads”. Friends moved the conversation along chatting, sharing, posting and liking. The campaign had everyone talking: over 10,000 groups participated, with over 1.2 million interactions and over 400K video views throughout the campaign, achieving 230% of ROI and proving that Pilsen Callao is the brand of True Friendship and friends will do anything to be together.

The campaign achieved important results both in terms of volume and brand equity.

- Pilsen Callao’s sales increased 18% against the previous year. Four times the growth of any other brand in the category.

- Volume growth represents an incremental sale of additional $8.8 million, 27% more than in 2013.

- The campaign contributed to an increase of +9pp in brand equity during the period that was active.

- The campaign helped to further consolidate the positioning of Pilsen Callao as a “brand that celebrates true friendship” by +7pp, reaching 64% at the end of 2014.

- Brand awareness reached 71% nationwide.

- The novelty brought in key performance indicators such “Is the brand that always makes new things”, which increased 5.7pp (47.7%) against the previous year.

With a legacy spanning over 150 years, Pilsen Callao is a pioneering and leading beer brand in Peru, whose purpose is to create and celebrate moments of true friendship.

2013 was a difficult one for the beer industry, with an overall decrease in sales of 4.7% against the previous fiscal year. However, due to a strong repositioning strategy and measures taken through the years, Pilsen Callao is now one of the most important Peruvian beer brands with over 28% of Market Share and a recognizable brand concept "The Taste of true Friendship" deeply rooted in the minds of Peruvians.