Anheuser-Busch InBev Builds Its Own US In-House Marketing Agency

For the past year, Anheuser-Busch has been quietly building its own in-house agency. And although AB InBev plans to officially announce its new creative arm later this week, here’s some of what we’ve learned.

In the world of advertising, few accounts are seen as valuable as Big Beer companies. And according to AdAge, Anheuser-Busch InBev, the world’s largest brewer has been quietly building its own US in-house agency for the past year…

“Dubbed Draftline, the agency has grown since May 2018 from a digital and social agency working only on Michelob Ultra, to working across all 42 US AB InBev brands, offering a range of services including TV production, packaging, out-of-home, radio, email marketing and data collection and fulfilling all programmatic media buying.”

In recent years In-house marketing shops such as Draftline are on the rise and their growth, which some see as cost-cutting moves, are increasingly viewed as a threat to external agencies.

And as AB InBev US Chief Marketing Officer Marcel Marcondes explained to AdAge the company’s relationship with Draftline is not necessarily exclusive, but it does afford the world’s #1 brewing conglomerate more creative immediacy and the ability to produce data-driven media that’s more localized and personal..

“We’re not doing this to create competition, it’s to do more…We want performance to go beyond what we have been seeing in the past couple of years.”

“The more we grab consumer insights by data, the more we feel confident about what we need to say and which kind of products address the needs of consumers. This is the fuel for good creativity, that with agility, can take us to a better place.”

MarketingDive is reporting that Draftline’s team of now 50 creatives, which is overseen by João Chueiri, AB InBev’s VP of consumer connections, currently work “on packaging, cans, sign-making, out-of-home, digital video, GIFs, memes, display, data collection, audience segmentation, email marketing, radio, programmatic media buying, analytics, influencer marketing, social listening, community management and more.”

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All image credits: AB InBev