Confidant | Agency Profile, Contacts, AOR, Client Relationships

• This hire replaces 72andSunny, its incumbent since 2013, which did not defend the account.
• Smirnoff is reportedly parent company Crown Royal, which means spend for Smirnoff will likely remain high.
• The brand also debuted an ad in which it gives viewers advice for imbibing alcohol during the holiday season.
  • Made by , it includes an interactive online experience that shows the experience of non-animated drunk drivers.
• The brand will likely:
  • Launch new work soon
  • Continue working with sports marketing via a partnership with the NFL
  • Keep increasing national TV spend and return to heavier digital spend
  • Seek additional influencer opportunities
  • Conduct additional agency review
• Target demographic: 
  • Millennials and Gen-X with a male skew

Additional spending insights:

• Broadcast insights (TV ad creative spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)
  • YTD spend: So far this year, Smirnoff has spent approximately $17.7m on national TV commercials, almost double the approximately $9m spent in all of 2021.
  • Last year: The brand spent around $9m on this channel last year, almost doubling when it spent around $5.4m in 2020.
  • 2022 ad programming: Smirnoff's 2022 commercials have targeted male sports enthusiasts watching shows such as NFL Football, the 2022 Winter Olympics, SportsCenter, NBA Basketball, and NCIS.
• Digital and social insights (digital ad spend, effectiveness, impressions, and performance)
  • YTD spend: The brand has allocated roughly $18m toward digital ads YTD.
  • YTD data: Since the beginning of 2022, Smirnoff has earned ~2.3b digital impressions via Facebook (50%), Instagram (38%), Twitter (5%), desktop video (3%), desktop display (3%), and mobile display (1%) ads.
  • Last year: The brand's estimated full-year 2021 spend reached $22m, 55% more than that of $14.2m in 2020.
• Additional channel insights  
  • The brand works with celebrity influencers such as Ted Danson and Laverne Cox.
    • Its latest work (see video above) plugged its NFL sponsorship and starred actor Anthony Anderson.
  • Along with the aforementioned channels, Smirnoff utilizes OOH, print (newspapers), and local broadcast.
  • It holds planning conversations in Q3 and buying conversations in Q2.

Additional agency insights:

• Opportunity: Additional roster shifts could easily follow this one, so get in touch soon to offer brand-specific PR, digital analytics, and/or digital analytics services for the Smirnoff brand.
• Current agency roster:
  • McCann NY: Creative AOR
  • Confidant: Creative agency partner (at least for the recent campaign project)
  • : Media AOR
  • : Digital AOR
  • : Creative agency partner
  • : PR agency partner

Insight Sources: Broadcast insights estimated by Kantar.​​​​​​​