Pepsi drafts in England players for £7m activity

by Nicola Clark, Marketing 19-Apr-06

Pepsi is launching a £7m campaign featuring 21 past and present England footballers to cash in on this summer's football action.

The push, using the strapline 'What's in your locker?', comes at a
crucial time for the Pepsi Max brand, as Coca-Cola is poised to launch a
rival sugar-free variant, Coke Zero, in the UK (Marketing, 5 April).

A TV execution, entitled 'Pepsi Max parade' will feature David Beckham,

John Terry and Rio Ferdinand as well as former England players David
Platt, Ray Wilkins and Chris Waddle.

The work will back an on-pack text-code promotion offering consumers the
chance to win an Xbox 360 console and a copy of the Sega game Football
Manager 2006 every 90 minutes.

Arif Haq, brand manager at Pepsi, said: 'The "What's in your locker?"
activity typifies what Pepsi Max is all about - it's an in-your-face and
light-hearted campaign that we hope will add to the footie fever this
summer.'

Last week Pepsi International unveiled a Bavarian-themed beer festival
ad, featuring David Beckham, Thierry Henry and Frank Lampard, promoting
speculation that the spot would be at the heart of the company's
football marketing platform this year. However, it is believed that
Pepsi's UK marketing team was keen to strike out with its own campaign
directly targeting England fans, and has no plans to launch the
international spot in the UK market.

Pepsi revealed it was withdrawing its sponsorship of the Football
Association late last year, marking the end of a four-year contract
worth an estimated £30m (Marketing, 14 December).

Coca-Cola has a multimillion-pound sponsorship deal with the FIFA World
Cup, which allows it to benefit from making direct links with the event.