• by Gavin O'Malley  @mp_gavin, May 17, 2010

Beginning Monday, Jim Beam Bourbon and Atlantic Records plan to offer fans exclusive downloads of Kid Rock tracks with their purchase of Jim Beam and Red Stag brands.

Accompanying a broad TV buy and online component, the promotion is relying on interactive TV shop BrightLine iTV to deliver a more immersive experience for fans.

Interactive TV makes our existing media buy work harder for us," said Kevin George, global CMO of Beam Brands.

The initiative also builds on an ongoing partnership between Jim Beam and Kid Rock, which goes to last year when the newly launched Red Stag by Jim Beam Bourbon brand sponsored Kid Rock's "Rock N' Rebels" concert tour.

"Bob's a really huge fan of Jim Beam," George said of Kid Rock. "We were talking together about how to take the partnership to the next level, and the interactive television component just made sense."

The branded iTV destination, designed by BrightLine, will enable viewers in some 20 million households to watch Kid Rock's performance last summer from his hometown of Detroit. Using their remote controls, viewers will also be able to browse a "Drink Recipes" section, featuring various Jim Beam and Red Stag mixes.

While interactive TV is all new to Jim Beam, George is credited with pioneering the medium during his time at Unilever -- where he spent 13 years before joining Jim Beam late last year.

In mid-2008, George tapped BrightLine to incorporate keyword search into TV spots for Unilever's Axe Bodyspray brand. The ads, aimed at promoting Axe's new Proximity line of personal care products, ran on interactive TV networks, including Verizon FiOS and Time Warner's Movie Trailers-On Demand. On Verizon, viewers were able to bookmark their favorite Proximity ads -- among other content -- and then search through it using specific keywords.

"Before that campaign, Unilever had never used interactive TV," said George. "When I left, they were (using it for) 20-to-25 brands."  [Unilever says it had, in fact, executed its first iTV campaign for Axe in 2005.]

The Kid Rock downloads, available via tear pad or on special-edition gift cartons of Jim Beam and Red Stag by Jim Beam -- where legal -- mark the first time a spirits brand and major record label have worked together to distribute new music using interactive TV, according to George.

Paying customers will get access to exclusive downloads of the new, unreleased song "Times Like These" from Kid Rock's upcoming album, along with a compilation of live hits from his two-night homecoming at Comerica Park last summer.

Earlier this year, BrightLine reported that 2009 revenues grew more than 100% year-over-year. That year, the company reported having executed more than 40 programs for brands, including Tylenol, Burger King, Hellmann's, Dove, Turbo Tax and Abreva.

BrightLine claims to work in partnership with every major TV platform, including Time Warner Cable and Comcast, as well as DirecTV, Dish Network, and a host of other DVR and on-demand providers, such as Verizon FIOS, TiVo and Xbox.