LICENCE TO DRINK

There are 4 types of chemical bonds:

• Ionic bond
• Covalent bond
• Polar bond
• James Bond 

Let’s concentrate on James bond. The latest movie Skyfall which is 23^rd of its series, is coming out this November. What you didn’t know is you will not hear his signature line anymore; the ‘shaken not stirred’ one. Now, he will say Heineken. Yes, Heineken the green-bottled Dutch beer. I was as surprised as you; the legendarily suave ladies’ man will actually drink beer. Alas! Could it be that James Bond is an ordinary bond – err, man, just like you and me?

Before you get angry that this Bond is now drinking beer, there are marketing/advertising and production reasons behind this partnership. In previous movies, the Bonds were so smooth that even when 5 goons are after him and a building is exploding behind him, he still has time to open the car door for a lady. This generation’s Bond, Daniel Craig, is a man’s man, not a ladies’ man. Compared to Pierce Brosnan, he is not as easy on the eye. He’s rough and tough. When he drink’s a man’s man drink, a beer, it’s believable.

I feel that with this partnership, Heineken has upgraded itself from being just a beer to being the  smoothest, badassest beer (drunk by the smoothest, badassest man). Its competition, Guinness, whose current slogan is ‘Come drink at the table of men’ will be in trouble after Skyfall premieres, simply because Bond is drinking Heineken; all men on the planet want to be James Bond (and all the ladies just drool and drop at his feet), so they are going to drink whatever he is drinking.

For a long time Heineken has sponsored sports; first Liverpool Football Club , then the UEFA Champions League which is a huge success. We are talking about the guys who brought Usain Bolt on as a hype man in last season’s final match between Chelsea and Bayern Munich. They should bring Daniel Craig this time. They have gone a step further, a step larger still, by choosing a universally popular far-reaching platform: the world’s longest-running movie franchise (James Bond just turned 50 on Bond Day, October 5^th). Heineken is branching out from traditional sporting sponsorship to entertainment industry, with one swift, well-calculated move. It is, quite simply, brilliant. I love it.

Just because Heineken positioned itself strategically with James Bond, today I give Heineken a ten over ten. The basic moral of this post is, positioning in a new market must be strategic and properly thought out.

As soon as I learned this information on a Friday afternoon, I promptly walked into a classy bar and did my best James Bond impersonation for the female waiter who quickly approached. In a charming, Bond-like manner, I lifted one eye brow and asked for a Heineken. She didn’t even notice that we were in my own movie, License to drink.