United Kingdom: Diageo develops a campaign to encourage shoppers to buy more beer

Diageo, the world’s leading alcoholic drinks maker, has launched a new campaign aimed at shoppers, the Wall Street Journal published on April, 7.

As people drink more at home, the company focuses on in-store displays for chilled beer.

The owner of Guinness beer is developing in-store displays to encourage shoppers to buy more of its products in supermarkets and liquor stores. Central to its approach is a plan to roll out big refrigeration units so stores can sell their beer chilled.

The idea is to create a partially enclosed, refrigerated beer zone within a supermarket aisle, using a design Diageo calls "the pod." The refrigeration units, which will cost retailers roughly €10,000 ($13,000) each, are intended to hold all kinds of beer, not just Diageo's brands, in an attempt to boost beer sales overall.

No retailer has yet bought the pod, which was designed by British in-store marketing specialist Design Central. But Diageo says it is working with Spar, a European food chain, to install a smaller version this spring.

The effort is part of a strategy by Chief Executive Paul Walsh to make Diageo, the world's biggest alcoholic-beverage company by revenue, better at working with supermarket chains, an increasingly important outlet for alcohol sales in Europe and the U.S.

In Britain, Molson Coors Brewing expects beer sales by supermarkets and other stores to overtake pub and club sales this year for the first time, according to a company spokesman.

Spirits account for most of London-based Diageo's profit, but beer is especially important to it in Ireland, where it brews Guinness as well as such brands as Budweiser and Carlsberg. Diageo Ireland learned that 78% of those who buy beer in Ireland drink it within three hours, says Henry Dummer, the company's head of customer marketing in Ireland. Many Irish supermarkets don't sell chilled beer, missing out on sales, he says.

Now, Spar has agreed to install Diageo-designed beer refrigerators in all 50 of its Irish Eurospar stores over the next two years, says Declan Ralph, Spar Ireland's retail-development director.

Diageo wanted British supermarket giant Tesco to install the first pod, says Mr. Dummer. But a spokesman for the retailer said it has "no plans" to do so in Britain or Ireland. A Diageo spokesman said Tesco is working with it on other beer-display projects, and that Diageo is in talks with other retailers about the pod.