Holsten Pils and FHM set up comedy competition

FHM will launch the competition in its July issue and on its website. Phipps PR, which won Holsten’s PR account at the start of the year, will develop a media relations campaign to interest regional and national media, as well as listings publications and the trade press.

Phipps associate director Naomi Proudlove said the campaign would draw on the regional differences in people’s sense of humour.

Holsten has traditionally positioned itself around ‘intelligent humour’ with distinctive advertising, said Proudlove, who worked on the account at the drinks firm’s previous agency Cohn & Wolfe.

She added that FHM shared a similar target market with Holsten and that by locating the competition in beer gardens, the campaign would reflect Holsten’s grassroots approach to branding.

The tour follows a major brand advertising campaign by Fallon launched on 1 May as part of a £12m investment in the brand, despite the impending handover to Carlsberg, which bought Holsten Pils in January.

The tour kicks off in Liverpool on 25 June with stops in London, Manchester, Cambridge, Leeds, Bristol, Newcastle and Oxford, before

returning to London on 30 September for the final of the competition.

The winner will take home £1,000, a year’s supply of Holsten Pils, a trip to the Holsten brewery and a year’s subscription to FHM, although Proudlove also hopes to use the winner for follow-up media work representing the brand.