Mike’s Hard Lemonade – America’s first-ever and top-selling hard lemonade – was about to celebrate a huge milestone with its 25th birthday on April 1, 2024 and we wanted to get consumers to party hard. Green Street Studios was charged with creating a social-first campaign that would cut through the clutter, amp up social engagement, and create a 25th birthday celebration as original as the brand. Our objectives were to:
Increase Share of Voice by 5%
Increase Instagram Followers by 10%
Keep Mike’s Top-Selling Hard Lemonade Top of Mind
Green Street Studios tapped into a key insight: that consumers' love for Mike’s is deeply rooted in nostalgia but never goes out of style. Most Mike’s lovers associate the brand with the positive memories of it being one of their first drinks and remaining a favorite for that reason. Related, the brand is also #1 in awareness across all Flavored Malt Beverage brands* because it was the first-ever hard lemonade that consumers had the chance to try.
To appeal to consumers' nostalgic love for Mike’s, our idea was to give away 25 days of custom Mike’s merch as birthday presents to our fans. So, we created the 25 Years, 25 Days of Giveaways social campaign. The 25 Years, 25 Days of Giveaways campaign kicked off on March 31, 2024 with an announcement post a day before Mike’s 25th birthday and ran for almost the whole month of April to give people a reason to celebrate the brand’s milestone in a big way.
We tapped into our best-of-the-best Mike’s merch that fit well with our theme and also designed a whole line of custom 25th birthday Mike's items for the 25 days of giveaways. The daily prizes ranged from Mike’s 25th Birthday T-shirts, bucket hats, bomber jackets, Mike's adult onesies, a pop-up party tent, lemon cooler, golf set, giant block game, cornhole set, grill and grill mat, and so much more.
On day 1, we kicked off the 25 days of giveaways with a paid social post that got our fans geared up for the excitement. Then, through daily organic posts and Instagram Stories featuring all custom photography and video assets, fans got the chance to win the birthday gift of the day. To enter, consumers had to follow Mike’s Instagram, like and comment on the daily giveaway posts with #Mikes25Giveaway and tag a friend.
On day 25, we gave away a grand prize $2500 gift card and $500 in Mike’s merch so one lucky fan could throw a Mike’s birthday party of their own. Overall, we gave away nearly 200 Mike’s merch items during the giveaway. (See submission deck for the full list of prizes).
Mike’s followers went absolutely crazy about the merch giveaways, igniting our social channels and sharing the news with friends to drive a ton of new followers and lots of happy winners.
*Kantar Brand Health Study conducted July 18-29, 2024 among 3,000 Past 3-Month Alcoholic Bev consumers.
The Mike’s Hard Lemonade 25 Years, 25 Days of Giveaways social campaign that ran March 31 - April 29, 2024 (including a wrap-up thank you post) was highly successful and exceeded our goal of social engagement:
8,981,173 social accounts reached (With Organic & Paid Social)
8.95% increase in social share of voice (Exceeding goal of 5%)
11.73% increase in Instagram followers (Exceeding goal by nearly 2% with 8,142 new followers)
+23% in total engagement (Exceeding goal by +13%)
364K+ impressions (+647% year over year)
100,000 total social interactions
196 winners awarded
*Data sourced from Sprinklr and Sprout Social
