The hydration category, which barely existed a decade ago, has developed a fondness for the cinematic arts.
Liquid I.V., the electrolyte powder brand that Unilever acquired in 2020, is attaching itself to the coming Spider-Man film with the kind of multi-platform promotional campaign that used to be reserved for soft drinks and fast-food chains. The arrangement includes product placements within "Spider-Man: Brand New Day," a television commercial, and a line of co-branded packaging — the full apparatus of what the entertainment industry has long called a promotional partnership and what the marketing industry now prefers to call an "entertainment strategy."
The new Spider-Man installment, the fourth in the current cycle, continues a storyline from "Spider-Man: No Way Home," in which Peter Parker was erased from the memory of everyone who knew him. (A plot point that, one imagines, the promotional department found less than ideal for building brand awareness.)
Liquid I.V. has addressed this narrative complication by building its campaign around Jacob Batalon, who plays Parker's best friend Ned Leeds — the one who, having forgotten Spider-Man entirely, is now available to remember hydration products. The 30-second spot shows Mr. Batalon walking through New York on a summer day, a setting that suggests both the Spider-Man films and the conditions under which one might reasonably purchase electrolyte powder.
For Unilever, which has been folding Liquid I.V. into its larger stable of health-adjacent brands, the Spider-Man arrangement represents another step in what executives there have described as an expanding entertainment approach. For Marvel, it represents another revenue stream from a franchise that has been generating them reliably since 2002.
The summer movie season, at least, remains thirsty.
Original story published in adweek.com: "Liquid I.V. Weaves Spider-Man Into Its Growing Entertainment Strategy"