The power of super-premium OOH to drive consideration and purchase intent

Hardys is the UK’s number 1 wine brand, and with Hardys brand the biggest in their portfolio, Accolade Wines wanted to protect sales and maintain their position as category leader. 

With the challenge of rising prices threatening sales volumes, and rising household costs were putting a strain on people’s finances, we needed to invest in the brand and premiumise the image of Hardys, to ensure that customers would continue to buy even at a higher price point.

With a clear regional skew to our audience growth opportunity, we decided to focus our budget on three key sales regions of London, the Midlands, and the North West. This regionality, together with the need to drive premiumisation, led us to invest over 80% of our total budget into OOH. 

We chose to run the campaign in November, to build brand strength ahead of the key December sales period, when wine buying increases and consumers tend to opt for more premium choices.

We elected to invest into super-premium, stand out sites, skewed towards commuting and an on-the-go audience. It was important to demonstrate category leadership, so where the competition tend to invest in 6 sheets or roadside 48s, we elected for large spectacular placements – after all, we wanted to premiumise and build trust in the Hardys brand.

Large format digital (LFD) formed the bedrock of our plan, blending roadside screens with large screens in pedestrianised areas. We booked some of the biggest and most premium sites in our key cities. To cover off our rail and underground commuters, we complemented this with a programmatic layer to access a range of premium digital formats with a bespoke Hardys audience.

This allowed to access a wider array of LFD screens, as well as Transvisions and D6s in rail and transport hubs. We also bought Digital Escalator Panels in our highest indexing tube stations, deeming the format consistent with our strategy of unmissable and high attention placements.