Majestic Wine partnered with the respected Observer Food Monthly in order to teach its audience which wines go best with different food.

1. Title: Majestic - Wannabe Wine Buffs
Category: Best Use of Content
SUMMARY
Many consumers are nervous of buying wine; we needed to show them that Majestic
understands. Given that it is more often than not food which drives wine selection, particularly for
our audience, we integrated Majestic Wine into recipe content in the respected Observer Food
Monthly more closely than ever before. We also created new and engaging content, all to teach
our audience which wines go best with different food, positioning Majestic as the friendly expert.
Brand perception and purchase intention went through the roof.
Background and objectives: In store experience is great so let’s get people through the door
Majestic’s core target group are “Wannabe Wine Buffs”. Just like most of us, they know a bit about
wine, but can often feel daunted by the sheer volume of choice that is out there. For many of these
consumers, visiting Majestic seems like something only a real wine expert would do.
This all changes as soon as we get a “WWB” in through the door. Once they get talking to our
friendly and knowledgeable staff, they understand how easy it is to pick a great wine at great value.
Our challenge was to convince more “WWB’s” to make the leap and come in store to have a
conversation.
Insight & strategy: Wine and food are a perfect pairing
Many conversations about wine start with food - 75% of wine is bought for consumption with food
(source: Majestic). Majestic believe wine shouldn’t be elitist or confusing so Majestic staff are all
experts at matching food with wine so this was identified as a really simple way for us to show how
useful Majestic could be.
The great thing about this insight is that WWB’s also have a real passion for food - cooking for
friends, eating out, trying new dishes. 74% of our audience love cooking (source: TGI). It also has the
scope for real scale as we are all becoming a nation of real foodies - last Christmas Jamie Oliver’s
latest cookbook got his third consecutive Christmas number 1!
To make our WWB’s sit up and listen we knew we needed to do more than just advertise to them.
How could we get the message across in a way that would truly engage them with the concept of
matching great wine with the great food they loved to prepare?
The plan: The perfect pairing: Majestic’s wine experts with the Guardian’s food experts
The perfect partner to help us tell this story was the Guardian and Observer Food Monthly. As well
as over indexing against our audience, the OFM presented the ideal editorial environment for us to
talk to WWB’s about matching Majestic wine with the food they loved to prepare.

2. Integrating with editorial more closely than had ever been done before, we matched every recipe in
Observer Food Monthly in the 2 issues running up to Christmas with a personal recommendation
from Majestic staff on the ideal wine to go with that dish. These “perfect pairings” were designed to
teach Wannabe Wine Buffs a little more about wine, give them a taste of the expertise on offer at
Majestic, and give them the confidence to come in store.
OFM’s impressive food content gave us instant authority and credibility. Creating complimentary
wine content allowed us to demonstrate Majestic’s knowledge, expertise and range. Using real staff
members also delivered readers the genuine ‘friendly face’ of Majestic.
To ensure that the wine selections were as useful as possible we arranged a media-first with the
OFM editorial team. Each recipe was shared with us in advance so that Majestic’s wine experts could
recommend the exact match. This was easier said than done as last minute editorial changes meant
that we had to work closely with Observer editorial in order to get the wine recommendations just
right. We were also able to run our advertorial features earlier in the book than they had ever been
allowed before, making this a truly integrated editorial and commercial venture.
We replicated the advertorials on tablet to extend reach. We also created video content featuring
Michelin-starred chefs demonstrating their favourite Christmas recipes, again with
recommendations from Majestic on the ideal wine to accompany the food.
As the content was so integrated with editorial, we were even able to sit our content on the home
page. OFM and some of their key contributors even tweeted about the videos.
Wine guide maps hosted on the Guardian and Majestic sites as well as in store exclusive OFM tasting
events, were further ways that we provided accessible and easy to understand reasons to believe in
Majestic’s expert credentials.
Results
Brand Aid research demonstrated that intention to buy from Majestic increased by 88%, and
perception of the retailer offering value for money rose by 55%. Over 84,000 people viewed our
videos with a dwell time of 3 minutes, and over 8,000 people entered the competitions.
Over 200 people entered to attend the reader events, and feedback was very positive, proving it
delivered on our key messaging; ‘I was fortunate to win 2 tickets to the Guardian wine tasting event
in Edinburgh. Above all I would like to praise the welcoming and knowledgeable staff. What I
particularly liked was that they were not at all pretentious. I hadn't previously shopped in Majestic
and imagined it was probably fairly expensive so was pleasantly surprised to find reasonable prices
and a wide choice plus good information from the staff.’ Eve Parker
We learned that by taking a very traditional advertiser away from broad display media into content
sponsorship and creation with a trusted newsbrand, we could make a huge difference to their plans,
showing tangible results of how their messaging really resonated with their core audience and
changed their perceptions.

3. Client view
‘The team at Mediacom proposed an innovative way to put Majestic in touch with the food-loving
readers of Observer Food Monthly. All parties involved in the partnership worked hard to ensure that
content was relevant and engaging for OFM readers and we were extremely pleased with the end
result. Our expectations were met and in many ways exceeded.’
David Sinfield, Marketing Director