The 13 brand owner members of the International Alliance for Responsible Drinking have set a new standard for compliance with digital marketing guidelines, according to the trade organisation.
The NGO said late last week that its members exceeded an internal target of 95% for this year to embed five measures for their brands’ online presence. As of this month, the rate of compliance from the companies for 2024 was 98.2%, up from 67% in 2018.
The five “Digital Guiding Principles” comprise:
- An age-affirmation mechanism – Checking that the user is over the country’s legal purchase age (LPA) for alcohol
- A forward advice notice – Notification that the content should not be forwarded to anyone under the LPA in the country of viewing
- A responsible-drinking message – Explicit promotion of responsible consumption
- A transparency message – Clarification that the digital marketing communication page is the official brand page, and
- A user-generated-content policy – Stating that any user posts condoning irresponsible consumption will be removed.
The approach was adopted by IARD, which is industry funded, in response to the United Nations’ call in 2018 for the alcohol industry to take “concrete steps” towards eliminating the marketing of beverage alcohol to underage drinkers.
“The Digital Guiding Principles, with their measurable standards and independent evaluation, have demonstrated the power of harnessing the private sector to supporting UN goals,” said IARD CEO Julian Braithwaite, who started in the role in March. “The UN strategy to tackle the harmful use of alcohol has seen deaths linked to alcohol fall 20% globally (2010 to 2019). As the UN prepares for its next review of its overall strategy on non-communicable diseases in 2025, we remain committed to supporting these goals.”
IARD’s 13 members are Anheuser-Busch InBev, Asahi, Bacardi, Brown-Forman, Carlsberg, Diageo, Heineken, Kirin, Moët Hennessy, Molson Coors Beverage Co, Pernod Ricard, Suntory Global Spirits and William Grant & Sons.
