How Diageo Manages its Brands
A case study of Brand Asset Management (BAM) in action
Diageo Industry: Global Drinks Site Scope: Brand Asset Management BAM Solution: VYRE Unify

Diageo is a UK success story. With a net sales close to £10Bn*, Diageo has 25,000 employees working globally across 180 countries. It is the acknowledged market leader in the global drinks industry and its 370 brands include category leaders and household-name brands such as Smirnoff (vodka), Guinness (beer) and Johnnie Walker (whisky). Great marketing and branding are central to Diageo’s success. Creativity in advertising and promotions in particular is a critical factor. Diageo excels in this area, and Guinness for example has won numerous accolades for its impactful advertising campaigns. With a £1.5Bn* annual investment in marketing, Diageo has been keenly aware of the need to protect its intellectual property and brand assets. This paper reveals how Diageo’s industry-leading global Brand Asset Management (BAM) system helps Diageo manage its exalted international reputation and global brand ambitions.
* year ended 30 June 2011

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Overview of SmartBrand SmartBrand is the name of Diageo’s BAM system and is actively used by c. 5,000 Diageo brand, marketing, and compliance managers world-wide, and Diageo’s agencies.

“ With a company of our size and complexity Smartbrand is essential in making it more effective, both at search and spin and from a compliance perspective. The site protects our reputation, assets and our ability to market our brands.”
Andy Fennell, CMO, Diageo PLC

SmartBrand is a suite of tools that helps Diageo marketers to find, create and adapt brand assets, and to share with, and learn from, other Diageo marketers. SmartBrand is where marketers find all the content created for brands. SmartBrand is also a project management tool to manage the creation of