The primary objective was to convince drinkers of the advantages of Murphy's new fast flow technology. This allows a pint of stout to be poured in 25 seconds as opposed to the 120 seconds it takes to pour a pint of Guinness.This was an opportunity to take on the consistently high-spending Guinness and beat it at a fraction of the price. Did we achieve our goals? Sales increased 17% year on year and the advertising was shown to prompt actual purchase more than any other beer advertising.

In the stout market Guinness rules. It has 96% share of advertising voice and 93% of volume sales. If you're going to take it on and be David to its Goliath, you need a groundbreaking idea. That Murphy's was able to do this was entirely down to the creative thinking of the team at Starcom. The team seized on Murphy's revolutionary fast flow technology (it takes five times as long to pour a pint of Guinness as it does a pint of Murphy's) and came up with the idea of the shortest TV ad break in the history of world advertising to launch this.

Starcom's Murphy's idea was special for a number of reasons. First and foremost a TV ad break that lasted only 10 seconds was a world first. For it to happen Starcom successfully persuaded TV contractors to do something they had never done before. In the context of competitive beer advertising (80% of which is on television), it was also noteworthy. Beer advertising has become a battle ground for cutting edge creativity consequently the target audience have come to expect it by right – we delivered advertising unlike anything that they had seen before.