How a Web Series About Tradition Helped a Beer Brand Reach Millennials

Woven Digital wants to make handcrafting look cool again with its Web series Human, produced in partnership with MillerCoors. Human's first episode features Cameron Weiss, the 27-year-old owner of Weiss Watch Company, the only U.S. watchmaker that finishes its own cases and dials by hand. Subsequent episodes have profiled people who have handcrafted surfboards and even motorcycles. The fourth episode, which debuted today, spotlights 30-year-old Jake Weidmann, one of only 11 Master Penmen in the world. "The whole series is built around things that are preserving tradition," said Woven CEO Scott Grimes. Human was born from another project the digital-media company produced for a different client about a custom sneaker manufacturer. "We had a lot of success around the storyline and the celebration of somebody venturing out and really going on their own to create a business that was a little bit off the beaten path," said Grimes. Woven and MillerCoors, which had an existing partnership, saw the series as a perfect fit for the Coors Banquet brand. "They were looking to move towards the original bottle and the original packaging," said Grimes. "A lot of the same aspect and quality of heritage and tradition and a lot of those similar themes that Human is built off of is exactly what Coors Banquet is built off of." Added MillerCoors' media director Brad Feinberg, "Coors Banquet's positioning is really about the modern pioneer. We really looked for a partner that was going to help bring that to life." Working on sponsored-content series like Human allows MillerCoors to advertise to a millennial audience—which Woven courts—that isn't as exposed to traditional advertising (Feinberg calls them "advertiser avoiders"). The company has also had similar partnerships with Comedy Central and Discovery Channel. The five-part series runs on Woven's UPROXX site, Facebook and YouTube pages, and Coors Banquet's Facebook page. The original goal was 750,000 views for the five videos, but the first three episodes have already garnered nearly 2.7 million views on both the UPROXX and Coors Banquet Facebook pages. "There's a huge void in the marketplace right now of very high-end, quality content that is digitally focused first and can integrate a brand in a very interesting way," said Grimes. Feinberg says MillerCoors was all-in on the production and didn't simply slap its name on it. "We really were involved in everything from reviewing scripts, attending shoots and ensuring that the message, look and feel really reinforced what the brand was about," he said.

Convergent TV

How a Web Series About Tradition Helped a Beer Brand Reach Millennials

MillerCoors, Woven shine spotlight on handcrafters

Tim Baysinger

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Tim Baysinger