Mark van Iterson, global head of design at Heineken, has told Marketing Week that they want their brand to become "the Apple of beer brands" and are embarking on new design-based marketing iniatives.


In an attempt to differentiate themselves in a crowded market, the Dutch brand want to optimise creative design and new sponsorship directions to put Heineken on top.

Innovator Iterson (Heineken's answer to Steve Jobs) said: “The beer market is becoming overcrowded with music, football and sport related marketing and we’re trying to leverage design almost as an activation platform to make the brand stand out. It’s design that makes products premium and that’s also for a large part true for Heineken.

“Design is the premiumness of this era. Brands like Apple, Audi and BMW have all demonstrated how design can elevate a premium positioning when its integrated closely with other aspects of a business. This is what we’re doing with the Heineken over the next few years. We want to be like Apple in the beer market.”

According to Marketing Week, 'much of the activity will centre on Heineken’s Ideas Brewery, an “open innovation platform” launched earlier this year to encourage fans to share ideas and feedback.'

Iterson added: “When we talk about a design culture at Heineken we mean it broadest sense of the word from packaging to glasses, to logos but its also what do we have on the pitch boarding of the championship or how do we design our Heineken house during the Olympics in London.”