Welcome to AL

If you’re going to disrupt the wine industry with a first-of-its-kind brand, your launch campaign needs a new playbook, too.

Element[AL] Wines just introduced the world’s first aluminum wine bottle in the shape of a traditional wine bottle. It’s a product innovation many years in the making, one that has significant sustainability implications for the industry.

The advertising campaign doesn’t look like your traditional wine campaign, either.

“No vineyard shots!” said John Kovacevich, creative director at Agency SOS, the agency that handled creative and media for the campaign. “No dirt-covered hands holding grapes or sun-kissed gourmet picnics. This is an entirely new way to wine; it needs a campaign as fresh and modern as the product itself.”

The “Welcome to AL” campaign is an invitation to discover and try something completely new.

“Element[AL] introduces aluminum as a lifestyle choice, not just a material, so we needed a launch as iconic as the bottle,” said Laura Wimer Jewell, director and executive creative director. “The brand is disruptive, energetic, and fun, and the product is the top priority amidst that energy of our muses in their Element.”

“We took a lot of inspiration from fashion,” said Kovacevich. “The bottles themselves feel like a must-have accessory as much as wine. They’re gorgeous, go-anywhere, and giftable. The campaign needed that same vibe.”

That’s reflected in the media, too. The campaign features video which will play on a variety of channels, including connected TV, social, and programmatic. It also includes fashion-forward print ads for publications like Vogue and Elle, as well as traditional wine publications like Wine Enthusiast. There’s a custom content partnership with Hearst. High-impact outdoor will be seen in New York, Miami, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Dallas, and Austin.

The campaign was produced by production company HONCHO!. The film was directed by Wimer Jewell. The photography is by fashion photographer Danielle Levitt.

The ads showcase the four Element[AL] varietals: Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, Rosé and Pinot Noir.

“Every set was designed with the bottle and muse in mind. We have created a sense of power when you step into the Element[AL] world,” said Wimer Jewell. “The aspiration comes from expressing yourself your own way.”

“Welcome to AL” is also an invitation into the larger aluminum story and what it means for the wine industry at large.

“Glass bottles are the biggest contributor to the wine industry’s carbon footprint.” said Paul Englert, Vice President of Marketing at Bogle Family Wine Collection, the company responsible for Element[AL]. “We were committed to finding a way to dramatically reduce the carbon footprint of traditional wine bottles in a manner that still connected with consumers. Our research indicates exceptionally high consumer purchase interest for this game-changing aluminum wine bottle.”

Element[AL] is the product of nearly four years of research and development. The brand is the first to market with new aluminum wine bottle technology with a sleek silhouette reminiscent of traditional glass wine bottles. Unlike traditional glass bottles, Element[AL] is label-less and is dressed in a 360° deco design printed directly on the bottle featuring bespoke hand-drawn artwork that is unique to each varietal.

“There are a lot of benefits to aluminum bottles,” said Englert. “They’re easy to recycle, lightweight (which cuts down on shipping costs), and shatterproof, which means they can go places a traditional wine bottle can’t.”

“But we knew that we didn’t want our ad campaign to just be a P.S.A. for aluminum,” said Englert. “Agency SOS helped us find a creative expression for the brand that’s as breakthrough in the category as we believe Element[AL] will be for the industry.”