The Macallan creates cinematic whisky experience

Alcohol brand The Macallan has launched a brand experience named "The Macallan Experience". Taking place at Raffles Hotel Singapore, the experience features eight rooms, each one designed to imprint meaningful memories on consumers of The Macallan’s brand journey. The campaign is done in collaboration with event agency Rebel & Soul.  The live experience will tour a number of The Macallan’s key APAC markets in 2020 and 2021. The tour launched in Singapore last week, in partnership with Raffles Hotel, where all elements of the brand experience will be hosted for four months, while its core elements such as the bar, whisky lounge, retail and VIP will stay for one year. 

The core elements of the room design included two films, two walls of casks, an indoor flame effect, an interactive moving art piece and a gravity-defying bottle display.

The pinnacle of The Macallan Experience is a 12-minute sensory cinematic whisky experience where the audience are invited to ‘taste the whisky worthy stories’. The key to this room is a film, designed in collaboration with cinematographers, creatives and technologists and based on the true stories of two inspiring individuals who made bold and brave decisions which led to positive outcomes. The stories in the film are paired with two variants of The Macallan and the audience is guided to taste and savour the whiskies at key moments, an experience said to be enhanced by what the audience can see, hear, touch, taste and smell. 

According to Rebel & Soul, the campaign is said to be accompanied with "detailed" marketing and event production blueprint for all The Macallan's APAC markets to follow, as well as fine touches such as a scent-infused gift wrap ritual for the retail area and stylised items to dress the whisky lounge. MARKETING-INTERACTIVE has reached out for additional information.

According to the team, the campaign plans had to be adapted due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For its sensory cinematic film, the original plan was a five-country shoot. However, as the pandemic developed and countries went on lockdown, the team had to change its plans. It finally managed to pull off the shoot in a brief week of relaxed lockdown measures in Australia, with creative direction and production via Zoom to a lighting speed studio built with a limited cast, crew and medics on set. 

Countries lockdowns were not the only obstacles, The Macallan also faced multiple factory closures in the UK and China. This meant that the producers were unable to oversee the design and installation of every experience needed. The closures resulted in on-site teams needing to receive precision training virtually and Rebel & Soul’s on-site production team had to learn fast. The team had particular difficulty when it came to the kinetic art installation, which involved complicated formations and precision programming. Every element of the installation had to then be designed, produced and tested remotely.

The Macallan was not the first brand to create creative assets virtually. Earlier this year during the lockdowns, we see companies such as Grab, IKEA, and Indosat Ooredoo remotely shooting their campaigns as well. 

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