• by Chuck Martin , Staff Writer, July 5, 2018

Malibu is connecting more of its bottles of rum.

As part of its “Because Summer” campaign, Malibu and its Internet of Things agency SharpEnd are creating 300,000 NFC-enabled bottles to be circulated in the U.K. and Germany this summer.

This follows a successful test of more than 40,000-connected bottles at 1,600 Tesco stores in the U.K.

“This technology brings us closer to our consumers through our products and allows us to on-board more markets as we deploy these connected bottles globally,” said Colin Kavanagh, vice president of global marketing at Malibu. “This powerful combination enables us to push the creativity of our bottles and capture new data insights about how our bottles are engaged and our product enjoyed.”

The aim of the connected bottles is to promote “Malibu Games 2018,” a campaign including dozens of global influencers, including pop singer Nick Jonas, which even has its own promotional website.

The connected bottles in the U.K. feature drink recipes and seasonal content beyond summer. Consumers can also join the Malibu Games through the bottles and compete for prizes. The NFC will trigger the engagement by a smartphone either being tapped or waved over the rum bottle.

This is not the first connected bottles experience for Malibu, having started using near field communication technology in 2015. In the 2016 trial, 45,000 bottles were connected and triggered a 3% engagement rate with a 48% conversion rate from those who tapped the bottles to authenticate with Facebook or Google, with more than half (52%) entering “instant win” competitions.

The IoT agency SharpEnd has been doing the connected bottles since the beginning of the programs with Malibu, as I wrote about here at the time (‘Agency Of Things’ Aims To Connect Brands).