Menu
People and Pop Culture

Plugged In: John Alvarado, Corona Extra

The commercial for Corona opens with fans watching fights, fists clenched, bobbing and weaving among friends. It then cuts to scenes of Premier Boxing Champions stars Deontay Wilder, Danny Garcia and Leo Santa Cruz doing the same, cheering from ringside. As vice president of marketing for Corona Extra, John Alvarado knows the sway boxing holds with Hispanic consumers. Early in the second year of the brand’s three-year deal with PBC, he sees potential for an even broader connection.


For the first time in Corona’s history, we developed a TV spot promoting a sponsorship that we have. Knowing that we have a full year of activating in front of us and a multiyear [deal] in front of us, we said, ‘Let’s go all-in in elevating the consumer’s experience.’ And the spot really is about celebrating the consumer’s experience — and of course promoting our partnership with PBC.


Photo by: CONSTELLATION BRANDS

On corralling a sport with no season: With PBC, we’ve been able to lay out a plan for the year because we know we’re going to have more than 40 fights in any particular calendar year of our agreement. So, actually, it has allowed us the opportunity to sit down and develop a cadence and a pool of assets that allows us to activate quickly and really blow it out across all the consumer touch points, from (point of sale) to digital to social to radio and TV.

On boxing’s return to broadly distributed networks: Having the sport be more readily available and accessible via the major networks and cable players was very important to us. It allows us the opportunity to continue to build a brand consumers love. That’s a core tenet of the way we operate as an organization. The ability to have the fights — and championship-level fights — readily available on television gives us the opportunity to put our world-class advertising around the fights and really engage consumers and help to build more momentum in that regard. That was certainly a factor in partnering with PBC. We saw it as a new and very attractive opportunity to further elevate Corona’s position in the sport.

On the audience: We’re seeing that the sport is doing really well among (male), 21-34, multicultural consumers. Hispanics, of course, but also African-Americans. You’re seeing fighters like Deontay Wilder, Danny Jacobs; that’s what we love about the PBC partnership. They’re putting out really high-quality fights involving multicultural boxers, and that’s engaging more consumers beyond just one particular demo. So we are seeing the sport continue to have a presence among the older generation but also seeing it attract millennials, which is also a focus of Corona.

— Bill King

SBJ Morning Buzzcast: March 25, 2024

NFL meeting preview; MLB's opening week ad effort and remembering Peter Angelos.

Big Get Jay Wright, March Madness is upon us and ESPN locks up CFP

On this week’s pod, our Big Get is CBS Sports college basketball analyst Jay Wright. The NCAA Championship-winning coach shares his insight with SBJ’s Austin Karp on key hoops issues and why being well dressed is an important part of his success. Also on the show, Poynter Institute senior writer Tom Jones shares who he has up and who is down in sports media. Later, SBJ’s Ben Portnoy talks the latest on ESPN’s CFP extension and who CBS, TNT Sports and ESPN need to make deep runs in the men’s and women's NCAA basketball tournaments.

SBJ I Factor: Nana-Yaw Asamoah

SBJ I Factor features an interview with AMB Sports and Entertainment Chief Commercial Office Nana-Yaw Asamoah. Asamoah, who moved over to AMBSE last year after 14 years at the NFL, talks with SBJ’s Ben Fischer about how his role model parents and older sisters pushed him to shrive, how the power of lifelong learning fuels successful people, and why AMBSE was an opportunity he could not pass up. Asamoah is 2021 SBJ Forty Under 40 honoree. SBJ I Factor is a monthly podcast offering interviews with sports executives who have been recipients of one of the magazine’s awards.

Shareable URL copied to clipboard!

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Journal/Issues/2016/05/23/People-and-Pop-Culture/Plugged-In.aspx

Sorry, something went wrong with the copy but here is the link for you.

https://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/Journal/Issues/2016/05/23/People-and-Pop-Culture/Plugged-In.aspx

CLOSE