Greene King and Woodforde’s set off with cunning campaigns

Greene King’s Old Speckled Hen and also the Woodforde Brewery are embarking upon some innovative promotions for their brands this summer.

Woodforde’s Brewery is inviting ale lovers to collect credits by visiting participating pubs in Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire. The relevant pubs will be listed in Woodforde’s Pub Guide. For each pint of Woodforde’s purchased, drinkers can collect credits which can then be exchanged for branded merchandise. All regular stockists of the Norfolk brewers ales have been invited to take part and 14,000 ale lovers are registered as Woodforde Club Members. Amongst the beers on offer will be Wherry, which is a former champion beer of GB. Four hundred pubs have signed up for the scheme, which runs from 20th June to the end of September.

Meanwhile Greene King is employing a fox to chase more converts to Old Speckled Hen. The adverts will feature on comedy channel Dave and follow the curious fox on a search for something different. The adverts perhaps take a nod to the legendary surreal Guinness advertising. They feature the fox encountering a highly idiosyncratic range of characters including a flamenco-dancing bull, a snooker-playing contortionist, acrobatic cleaners, penny-farthing racers, a man with a giant balloon bouncing over his head and a musician playing a super-sized saxophone, But only Old Speckled Hen proves individual enough for the discerning fox. The short-clip style promotions are part of Old Speckled Hen’s sponsorship of Prime Time Dave.

Meanwhile, a team of four from North Yorkshire’s Black Sheep Brewery is embarking on a highly demanding journey of its own to the Arctic Circle, to raise funds for a breast cancer charity. The brewery’s Big Push Up campaign has raised £36,000 with a range of fundraising events.

15 June 2009