Marketing magazine has this week named Stella Artois as the highest ranking beer brand (15th Place) in its top 50 take-home brand rankings. Andreas Hilger, marketing director of InBev UK & Ireland had this to say about the achievement:

“Stella Artois has retained its crown as the nation’s number 1 beer and it is no mean feat for us given an increasingly crowded market place and challenging conditions for our industry. Our investment in the brand has ensured that our consumers continue to understand and appreciate Stella Artois for its superior quality, craftsmanship and heritage. This focus on our core values across all of our marketing activities is helping to demonstrate that we are leading the way in our category with another recent independent consumer study showing Stella Artois is the highest ranking lager brand and in the Top 100 of the strongest brands in the country, as voted for by the British public (Superbrands 2008/09).”
This summer saw an upweighted outdoor campaign for Stella Artois, the launch of Stella Artois 4% and an airship flying over London for the first time in decades with the Stella Artois: Star Over London- all playing a part in generating a sense of excitement and vigour around the brand.

Hilger continues; “Our focus moving forward is to not only ensure we are the leading premium lager amongst consumers and the trade but to also operate in a responsible and sustainable way. We are currently running initiatives that support the pub trade, for example, our London-based, ‘Love Your Local’ campaign encourages consumers to support pubs that play a positive role in their community and promotes responsible drinking. In addition, our recent changes in packaging has seen us reduce our environmental impact with our 330ml and 250ml bottles best-in-class in terms of bottle weight. These are just some of the types of activity we will be working on into next year and we fully intend to continue to improve and innovate the brand, our operations and our marketing activity - we are happy to say that there is more a lot to come!”