“If Brazil wins, I’ll walk to church on my knees.”
“I’m not shaving until we’re holding the cup in our hands.”
These are examples of a promessa, a ritual vow a Brazilian fan makes in public, that they will pay off if their home team wins the World Cup—something that hasn’t happened in 24 years.
The beer brand Brahma built an entire World Cup campaign around this concept with, “It’s OK to Believe,” brilliantly turning that individual ritualistic vow into collective belief for the entire country: If Brazil wins its sixth title, Brahma—owned by AB InBev’s Brazilian subsidiary Ambev—will be free nationwide, redeemable via Zé Delivery, supermarkets, and accredited bars.
Many brands use creative tactics in Latin America that are steeped in local culture, and that many U.S. marketers might find surprising.
When we think about the majority of American game-day food marketing, it often feels much more transactional. The core messages are often: buy the wings, prepare for your party, here’s a coupon.
But Brahma’s campaign, and these two others from Latin American, offer a shared lesson to marketers who might be used to seeing the U.S. as the cultural default.
“El Extra” sells the welcome, not the win
Corona gives us another example of leveraging local culture in its World Cup campaign, “El Extra de México es Mundial” which roughly means “Mexico’s ‘extra’ is world-class.” The concept of el extra is the Mexican idea of giving more than is required, tapping into a cultural value of going the extra mile and taking pride in how you go about your work.
Corona wisely ties the campaign to national pride in hospitality, drawing on the fact that Mexico is the only country to host three World Cups.
The campaign frames it not only as a logistics win, but the chance to show the world how Mexicans treat their guests. Culturally, there is a deeply-held idea that being a good host is linked to pride. Think “mi casa es su casa,” but as a collective self-image, rather than just a polite phrase.
Contrast this campaign with those we see from alcohol brands in the U.S. for the World Cup, which tend to lean on nostalgia for the past, or ideas of dominance and American exceptionalism.
Those ideas are directly at odds with reaching a market that might have arrived more recently, and that wants to preserve their own cultural heritage.
