Helping a Reality TV-born Brand Get Real

Loverboy had gone from storyline on Bravo’s Summer House to genuine RTD brand, ahead of the curve with higher-quality ingredients, lower calorie counts and the growing popularity of sparkling hard iced teas. Founders Kyle Cooke and Amanda Batula had no problem getting themselves and their brand attention from celebrity-oriented media.  What they needed was for more serious-minded outlets to pay attention, to grow awareness among retail decision-makers and non-reality- TV-watchers who would appreciate what the brand delivered.

Our two-tracked approach focused on needle-moving business and trade outlets on one side, and on authority-building consumer media on the other.

Step one with trade outlets was to build a business persona for Kyle that highlighted his MBA status and lifelong entrepreneurial POV. We parlayed it into high-wattage speaking slots at the likes of Wine & Spirits Daily’s and BevNET’s annual conferences and into features in Forbes, Business Insider, Beer Business Daily and Shanken News Daily, among numerous others.

Meanwhile, we generated the brand’s first-ever coverage on network morning shows and shopping bibles by focusing on the brand’s better ingredients bona fides, and by finding fits for Loverboy in the likes of cocktail coverage and other adjacent, trend-centric categories.