In the latest dentsu Global Ad Spend Forecasts, published in December 2024, spending from advertisers in the Beverages category is forecast to grow by 1.8% in 2025. In this article, we explore more specifically the opportunities ahead for advertisers of alcoholic drinks.
Alcohol brands turn to media to drive growth
As social norms change, younger people are drinking less alcohol than previous generations. It is therefore not a surprise that marketers in the Alcohol category are more eager than their peers in other industries to launch net new products and expand to new geographies to pursue growth, as highlighted in the latest dentsu CMO Navigator - Media Edition.
To bring their strategies to life, 82% of them recognize the increasing importance of media as a key driver for their business growth. Yet, how they invest their media dollars is evolving to mirror how audiences consume their products and consume media.
For example, we could see a redistribution of global spend toward emerging markets like the African continent to compensate for reduced consumption in more established markets. However, geographical expansion in this category comes with many distribution and regulatory challenges, and marketers must ensure their company’s’ operations are able to deliver on the ground to capture the demand generated by media investment.
Media strategies converge within the category
Beyond geographical budget reallocation, we could also see a media mix reallocation. The two largest segments of the category, beers and spirits, have traditionally pursued different strategies with their ads, yet could now see their respective strategies becoming closer together.
Beers generally market themselves like consumer-packaged goods (CPG) brands with broad reach on mainstream channels like TV and out of home aiming for mass appeal to back up their wide distribution in multiple retailers. Brands pride themselves on consistency and uniformity, and many aim for global fame.
By contrast, spirits often market themselves in a similar way to luxury brands, emphasizing the quality and heritage, and investing in brand ambassadors, limited edition specials, and collaborations. Media choices tend to be similar to luxury brands, including events, luxury media mix, niche partnerships and out of home, especially in travel locations.
However, recent years have seen the two categories move closer together. Spirits are starting to behave more like CPG, because campaigns need to show more evidence of a return on investment, rather than column inches of coverage, and beers are starting to invest more in partnerships and content in light of evolving legislation around advertising across markets. In addition, both want to elevate brands to create broad desire, learning from other categories that succeed in creating this sense of desire among large groups of people.
Permeating culture becomes the top priority
As marketers in both segments look to permeate culture, they are keen to focus on big cultural opportunities and on moments of consumption. For example, 2024 saw the first ever beer sponsor of the Summer Olympic Games with a non-alcoholic beer from Anheuser Busch, both spirits and beer brands now sponsor Formula One, and AB InBev is already the official beer partner for the upcoming FIFA Club World Cup.
Concerned with the difficulty in owning the customer relation, alcoholic brands are also eager to find their tribes. Through social media, many brands try to get a high share of occasion to be top of mind at key times of year, for example, champagne at Christmas. Since we live in a more visual age of greater screen time, many of the most famous brands with iconic brand assets, including their color (Guinness, Aperol) and their packaging (Absolut, Bombay Sapphire), or even brand personalities (Johnnie Walker), are able to capitalize on their unique assets like never before, giving them both a moment and message to promote. Additionally, while CMOs in the category are more concerned than their peers about declining control over brand in the creator economy, some examples like Heineken’s embracing how people mispronounce its name show alcoholic brands are progressively becoming more comfortable in culture.
The Retail media conundrum
Retail media is the fastest growing ad spend channel overall in 2025 (+21.9%). While it feels like it should work for alcohol brands as it does with many other products, including other CPG and luxury, for many advertisers in the category there is still reticence and hesitation to get involved. Beverages are often heavy and hard to transport safely, many have not yet seen proof of retail media’s impact in driving sales, and while the extra data for targeting is attractive, its added cost makes this channel a far more expensive way of reaching audiences compared to many others. The development of better fulfilment, such as on demand delivery from partners like Deliveroo and Uber, may help, but there is also the challenge to maintain separate marketing teams for shopper marketing, something which other categories are also trying to solve.
From consumer brands to luxury, from niche moments to mass marketing, 2025 is set to be an exciting year for advertisers in the Alcohol category. To find out more about ad spend trends across industries, download the dentsu Global Ad Spend Forecasts today.
