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Christmas has always been an important occasion and opportunity for Glenfiddich, and last year was no different. Whisky is a popular gift over the festive period, which means that every distillery and brand try to make sure that it’s their bottle that makes it under the Christmas tree. With so many to choose from, we had to do something different.

“For some, traditions don’t have to be traditional.”

For the Glenfiddich Christmas campaign we wanted to do something that reaffirmed their status as the Maverick Whisky Makers of Dufftown. The campaign had to stand out, but not be so maverick as to put off our core purchasers who gift whisky at this time of year.

So how do you do maverick at Christmas? We considered the idea that although the festive period is usually time for tradition and conformity, it doesn’t have to be. For some, traditions don’t have to be traditional.

“What could be more maverick at Christmas than taking an icy dip in a Loch to start the festivities?”

Having found a group who do just that, we approached them to be the face of our Christmas campaign. So, kitted out with a flying camera drone, underwater cameras, frogmen and plenty of warm clothes, we travelled to Loch Lomond one very chilly day and captured what it truly means to be maverick at Christmas.

With the maverick moment captured, the next step was to amplify it in social; we discovered that these swimmers had some fantastic stories about their swimming adventures that were too good not to share. From swimming with 30ft Minke whales to being called ‘bonkers’, we made them the centre of our festive campaign with their stories featuring on the website.

After reaching 1.6 million people, with the Maverick at Christmas video, 1.06 million viewed the video with 26% watching for over 30 seconds – an unprecedented result for any Glenfiddich UK campaign.

The landing page hosting the maverick story garnered over 32K views, a 57% increase from 2014, with an average dwell time of 02:58, 01:25 minutes longer than the Christmas campaign for 2014.