Adam Gilchrist wants Australians to have smoother and better tequila experiences in the launch of his brand El Arquero, a collaboration with Emotive and Creativity & Commerce co-founder Justin Drape.
The brand, founded, created and fronted by Gilchrist himself, is a first in Emotive's new brand incubation model.
Gilchrist told AdNews he wanted to create a spirit that mixed the flavours and community of Mexico and Australia.
“It’s driven from a real interest and love of the product,” Gilchrist said.
“I started fooling around with the idea, trying to identify the feedback from so many of my friends over the years.
"When I mentioned tequila, they found it too aggressive and too hot.
“We went through about six or seven rounds of sampling before we settled on our liquid profile, to try and take away that real ethanol alcohol burn."
Distilling El Arquero takes a percentage of the base liquid out and rests on oak barrels for 20 days. It is then blended back in.
"It allowed us to take away that aggression of the taste at the back of the sip but not lose any of the flavours, notes and the warmth of tequila," Gilchrist said.
El Arquero translates to ‘keeper’ in English, a tribute to Gilchrist’s long history as an Australian-based, international cricketer and wicketkeeper.
The packaging features a person with his arms open wide to the sun. Gilchrist sees this as an overlap of Mexico and Australia’s admiration for summer.
“The big alcohol brands have always been in and around sport. I've spent my whole life chasing the sun in cricket,” Gilchrist said.
“Like any celebration, whether it's sporting or family, personal milestone or achievement in business.
“Our strategy was sharing it with summer in mind, our love of the sun, our admiration, our acknowledgement to the landscape and lifestyles that lead with sunny, warm environments.
“It’s all about that connection and connectivity around a shared event or shared experience.”
This is the first time Emotive have used their new brand incubation model, which took about 6 months of preparation and featured large collaboration between Adam Gilchrist's team, Emotive, Justin Drape and Wellcom.
Emotive executive strategy partner Sebastian Revell said that over the last 12 months, they have seen brands and businesses who are looking for brand direction from inception, not only once the product launches in market.
“We started working with Justin Drape pretty closely, who has huge experience in growing businesses from the ground up,” Revell said.
“His expertise, coupled with our team of senior specialists at Emotive, seemed like a great opportunity to find a brand where we could use this model.
“And our CEO Simon Joyce was talking to Gilchrist for a while about what's he up to, and this opportunity came up, so it became not only a test vehicle, but the first cab off the rank in testing this model."
Revell said that part of understanding how to market El Arquero was looking at how beer is marketed in and around sport.
“Australia is the third biggest consumption market for tequila in the world,” said Revell.
“We love our Tequila. It suits the environment and climate so well. But now we have an option in El Arquero that is not only smooth but versatile and so good for mixing.
“We took a lot of inspiration from what beer tries to do around sport and summer. We're a premium spirit and want to be seen as such, but we were looking at beer as an opportunity to bring people together and how it does it.
Creativity and Commerce co-founder and Ex-The Monkeys co-founder Justin Drape helped execute the creative campaign, behind-the-scenes content and pitched the slogan ‘we’re all in this tequila.’
The campaign features friends, family and Emotive staff, including Gilchrist’s wife Mel.
“We wanted the authenticity of Gilchrist to come to life in a way that conveyed that sense of community and connection that's really important to Gilchrist, Mel and all of the business partners,” Drape said.
“They’ve all been on this amazing tequila journey together and now everyone's welcome to join them.
“The line of positioning, 'we're all in this tequila', also acknowledges that many Australians have been subjected to horrible tequila for decades.
“With El Arquero, we're acknowledging that and offering people a better and smoother alternative.”
Production was delivered in partnership with Wellcom, with Emotive Productions overseeing social content and Wellcom producing the hero film.
They worked with director Christopher Hill and featured music from Deep Faith’s Dan Stricker and Byron Spencer.
“Having Gilchrist as the co-founder of the business, star of the campaign, and the client is quite unique, but him and the team were able to consider every decision and then act upon it quite effectively,” Drape said.
“So, it felt like a genuine collaboration, and it was really fulfilling.
“Ultimately it saved the team a lot of money and frustration, because there was this great transparency and spirit.”
Gilchrist wants to ensure that El Arquero is treated both as a premium product, seen on the shelves of bars, but also as a way for communities in Australia to come together.
“We wanted to start by showcasing that we are a premium spirit, and we feel confident in the brand, logo, bottle and the brand essence,” he said.
“Over time, we also want to create that versatility, that we can be accessible to everyone. It can be an enjoyable shared experience.”
The success of El Arquero is measured based on the experience of the consumer, and the longevity of the product, Gilchrist believes.
“Survival is going to be key,” Gilchrist said.
“It's a passion project, and it continues to be so fun.
“More holistically, it’ll be the feedback, the reaction of people. Not knocking them away from other tequilas, but that sense of connection and a great experience.
“The feeling ‘we're all in this tequila’, that's success in my mind.”
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