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Brands & Merch Business News Live Business
Live Nation announces global brand alliance with Smirnoff
By Chris Cooke | Published on Friday 13 March 2015
Well, I don’t know about you, but I always like to wash down my MDMA with a shot of vodka, so it makes perfect sense that Smirnoff would want to plonk its branding all over 26 EDM festivals owned or co-owned by Live Nation.
And amongst the lucky dance music events set to have Smirnoff splashed around the place are the US-based Electric Daisy Carnival, HARD and Wonderland events, and UK festivals like Creamfields, Wireless, Latitude and Reading. Hmm, I guess the deal isn’t specifically EDM-focused on this side of the Atlantic.
Nevertheless, Matt Bruhn, Global Brand Director for the vodka brand, told Billboard: “Smirnoff as a brand is all about inclusivity, enjoying life and having a great time, so we saw a natural fit in the electronic music genre and lifestyle. What we’re trying to do is not just advertise our way to success but act our way to success”.
And those of you playing brand-partnership-quote bingo should enjoy this second quote from Bruhn too. “This long-term partnership with Live Nation will amplify our global vision around our passion for music and always making the fan experience a top priority. Together we have the opportunity to enhance this experience even further through tearing down the barriers between fans and artists”.
For his part, Live Nation’s President Of Media & Sponsorships Russell Wallach contributed some quality quoting action too, explaining that “Live Nation has the biggest and most diverse festival platform in the world. We are focused on finding partners that want to enhance the fan experience on-site and create compelling content for the fans not there”.
You know, all this talk of “enhanced experiences” makes me wonder… are the kids mainly swallowing their MDMA these days, or is snorting the consumption method de jour?
If it’s the latter, well, I wouldn’t recommend then snorting the vodka. Believe me, that’s an initiation task you’d rather avoid. But hey, I’m certain that Live Nation did its research, and if the kids were mainly snorting their drugs in 2015 it would be Kleenex not Smirnoff badging all the festivals this summer.
