• by Steve Ellwanger , March 7, 2023

 

Guinness beer wants pandemic-fatigued people to “surge together” on St. Patrick’s Day, while Jameson Irish whisky will pay someone to skip work on March 17 and leave a cardboard cutout bearing their likeness at their workplace.

To encourage drink toasts in the leadup to the holiday and beyond, Guinness will award more than $1 million in $10,000 cash prizes to two people in each state plus the District of Columbia based on toasting videos uploaded to a dedicated website by March 24.

As for “surging,” Guinness wants people to prepare for “the best St. Patrick’s Day of your life” as they come together in a variety of venues.

Running throughout March, this national television commercial from Quaker City Mercantile and Diageo Beer Co. USA celebrates family, old friends and new ones at bars and outdoor gatherings.

Along the way. there are brief sightings of former pro football star Joe Montana and 2015 “Top Chef” contestant Kwame Onwuachi.

“This is our moment to start surging together again as Guinness has for centuries,” Mark Phillips, head of beer and hard seltzer at Diageo North America, said in a news release.

Jameson is turning paid-time-off (PTO) into SPTO—St. Patrick’s Day Time Off—in a campaign featuring actor and producer Regina Hall.

Until March 10, consumers can visit a dedicated website and order a $17.80 Jameson Desk Decoy—a life-size cardboard cutout bearing their likeness that can stand in for them at work

To win a $10,000 bonus, entries by people who pledge not to work on St. Patrick’s Day can be made on the Jameson website.

On March 17, Jameson will video call an entrant late in the afternoon and will award that person the $10,000 and if he or she is seen celebrating with friends, Irish whiskey and an empty work calendar.

In this spot from Weber Shandwick and UEG agency, Hall’s Desk Decoy sneakily reviews scripts, participates in a colleague’s birthday party and stands in during a photo shoot while she is out celebrating St. Patrick’s Day with friends and a glass of Jameson.