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Dewar’s aims for relevancy in Scotch’s new age
Brian Cox, vice-president of Dewar’s North America, explains how the brand’s new campaign meets changing premiumisation trends.
According to Cox, Dewar’s is setting its sights on the “experiential-based consumer of today” with its new ‘Here’s to the Story’ campaign, which rolled out last month, where “social kudos is gained more by showing who someone is and what they’ve done.”
The campaign’s tagline refers to celebrating experiences and encounters with people, rather than material possessions. These stories are to be told and shared with a glass of whisky in hand. The intention is to position the brand as the ‘ultimate companion for life explorers’.
“It’s an exciting time and direction for us,” Cox explains. “We’ve done what a lot of brands are doing in the luxury space, which is reframing by looking at our DNA and founding story.”
Dewar’s was founded in 1846 by John Dewar, with his sons Tommy and Alexander Dewar carrying on his empire afterwards, travelling all corners of the globe, introducing themselves to people and getting liquid to lips. Cox says the pair would “disappear for years on end, with the spirit of discovery and curiosity that would drive them from New Zealand to the US and Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC)”.
“Those invariably make for great stories. So, in a way, we framed it on some of our backstory, but looking at the future and making it relevant to folks today.”
New ideas of status
Dewar’s is consistently one of the world’s biggest-selling Scotch whisky brands (in 2023, it was the sixth biggest), but in an increasingly competitive market, it’s important to stay ahead by attracting a wider range of drinkers, including a ‘younger’ demographic, says Cox.
He notes that, in the late 70s and 80s, the brand would position itself as a way to show status: “Status back then was defined very much by showing what you have.” Today, status has evolved to what Cox calls a “modern notion of discernment”.
“When you look at Scotch, and Dewar’s consumption in particular, you know great stories are shared over a great glass of whisky, and the greatest are shared over a glass of Dewar’s – that adheres to the story. It’s a way of showing your experiences, of sharing them, and that today is very much what I think social currency and status is about.”
He explains: “In that sense, it is reframing the brand into something more contemporary and certainly more relevant to today’s consumer. It really is more about a mindset, a psychographic profile, than it is about demographics. Scotch –and all whisky – is consumed by a much broader range of consumers than it was in the past, and that’s a great reality of today.”
Playing in the premium-plus space is a relatively recent evolution for Dewar’s, Cox observes. Premiumisation has been a leading trend for many spirits categories, with Scotch a key driver, which has helped to rejuvenate the category’s image.
Cox says that people tend to enter the category today in their late 20s or early 30s: “There’s a life stage where people enter premium spirits, which is more to do with the premiumisation, rather than necessarily with Scotch.”
This has been good for Dewar’s because “when you look at the kind of knowledge consumers have today about products, it’s driven a lot of people to come naturally towards Scotch and blends, and Dewar’s therefore – especially in the US, where, historically, it is one of the leading brands.”
While there are signs that premiumisation is starting to slow, Cox believes this is a “temporary bump in the road” and that the “fundamental demands and needs of the consumer are still there and, therefore, we still see the underlying dynamic being there.”
Linking the ‘Here’s the Story’ campaign with changing notions of premiumisation, Cox believes the key is finding what’s motivating today’s generation of whisky drinkers, and that luxury tends to be more casual these days, especially in the US, whereas “it tends to be more formalised in Europe”. Cox says the campaign is looking to “bring Dewar’s out of this world of formality”.
Looking at the fundamentals of Scotch, Cox maintains that terroir is really important: “The people who make the spirit, age it, and the land from where it comes from: that’s a whole story in of itself. Then it’s about these moments that matter and being a bit of a catalyst for social interaction, in a positive sense.”
The next chapter
Leveraging the experiential side of premiumisation, the brand has partnered with the US Open Golf Championship, which saw it offer gifting opportunities, limited special editions, on-trade promos (at “massive country clubs, but also hotels and regular neighbourhood bars”), and create an on-site ready-to-drink (RTD) cocktail at the tournament named the Lemon Wedge (made with lemon and Dewar’s 12-year-old).
The RTD aims to ‘deseasonalise’ Dewar’s consumption and make it an applicable drink for the summer months. Meanwhile, with the tournament falling on Father’s Day next year (Sunday 15 June 2025), the brand is ripe for gifting opportunities, which have traditionally been concentrated from October to December.
Dewar’s has also partnered with Michelin-starred chef Gabriel Kreuther, allowing the brand to tap into the on-trade and introduce itself to more consumers via whisky-hosted dinners and more.
Cox says the ‘Here’s to the Story’ campaign will be particularly apt during the upcoming Thanksgiving period, “which is why [I’ve] been so busy flying around the US, introducing our sales forces and wholesale partners to the campaign, because going back for that holiday period in America and sharing good spirits with friends and family is such a key moment.
“Again, there’s part of premiumisation that’s not being stuffy, not being formal. It’s being open – that is what you want in terms of conversation and sharing these experiences. That’s part of the pleasure of coming together with friends and family. It’s the storytelling that goes with that and those good times.”
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