Mountain Dew - long associated with US video gaming - has set its sights on British gamers.

The largest-ever UK push for the PepsiCo brand kicks off later this month with a limited-edition variant and a tie-up with Halo 4. Mountain Dew is enjoying strong growth since its UK launch in 2010, with sales up 82.3% by volume and 64.5% by value to £17.6m [SymphonyIRI 52 w/e 30 June 2012].

The brand’s British bottler, Britvic, will be rolling out a raspberry flavoured Mountain Dew variant called Game Fuel, which it claimed offered consumers “the ultimate drink to enjoy during gaming sessions”. A limited-edition Mountain Dew Game Fuel was rolled out in the US in 2007 in association with Halo 3, with later US editions of the drink tying up with World of Warcraft and Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3. This helped cement Mountain Dew’s association with gaming in the US, a strategy the brand appears to be repeating in the UK.

The Halo 4 promotion, which will run on regular Mountain Dew and Game Fuel, is aimed at 16 to 24-year-olds and gives them the chance to win prizes including trips to the US. “Given how relevant gaming is with our core consumers and Mountain Dew’s history of gaming, we’re expecting this activity to exhilarate Dew fans,” said PepsiCo UK senior brand manager Simon Cheape.

Mountain Dew will face competition for the hearts of British gamers - Global Brands energy drink Kick also has a history of marketing itself to UK gamers.

Source

Vince Bamford

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