#BoycottHeineken trends in UK after brewer celebrates vaccines

Some posted videos online of themselves opening bottles of the brewer’s namesake lager and pouring it down their kitchen sinks in protest

The world’s second-largest brewer joins companies implementing ad campaigns and corporate policies to promote inoculation

Heineken ran a minute-long ad on social media on Thursday showing senior citizens dancing in a nightclub and racing to skinny-dip at a nearby beach. 

It ended with the message, “The night belongs to the vaccinated. Time to join them.” 

By Friday, bands of aggrieved users on Twitter in the UK were threatening to #BoycottHeineken.

Some uploaded videos of themselves opening bottles of the brewer’s namesake lager and pouring it down their kitchen sinks in protest.

The world’s second-largest brewer joins companies implementing ad campaigns and corporate policies to promote inoculation.

Cheers to the vaccinated. Time to join them. #FreshBeginnings pic.twitter.com/uKeYOWKuEH

— Heineken (@Heineken) July 8, 2021

Top executives are increasingly positioning themselves at the forefront of fighting anti-vaccine sentiment, which is marked in countries such as the US, UK, France and Russia.

It also poses a singular risk to the business models of brands built on social interaction in bars, restaurants and nightclubs.

CEOs become vaccine activists as back-to-office push grows Budweiser beer, owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev, decided not to run a commercial during the Super Bowl in February for the first time in 40 years and instead allocated that spending to the Ad Council’s pro-vaccination campaigns. Immunizations will “liberate people,” former chief executive officer Carlos Brito said at the time.

Unilever CEO Alan Jope has said he’s signing weekly letters to the company’s 150,000 employees urging them to get vaccinated when possible, and has invited the company’s doctor to promote inoculation on twice-monthly virtual town halls.

- Bloomberg