In terms of Beerfest Asia and Oktoberfest in marketing strategy, both of them have similarities and differences in their experimental and facilitating components—mainly the product, place, programming, people, partnerships, promotions, packaging and distribution and price.
Product—both festivals offers the same product, which is the beers. Both festivals also provide a wide range of beers for drinkers to choose from. Beerfest Asia offers beer from all over the world, which cannot be found in Singapore. However, Oktoberfest only offers beers that are only brewed locally in Germany.
Place—they are both situated outdoor in tents or marquees near an attraction of the host community. For Beerfest Asia, the festival ground was located on the F1 tracks, which is behind the Singapore Flyer facing the Marina Barrage. As for Oktoberfest, it is located near an amusement park. Surprisingly, a lot of visitors do not visit Oktoberfest for the beer, but the other attractions like the amusement park, the roller coaster and other varieties.
Programming—both festivals have programmes such as music and entertainment. For Beerfest Asia, as their target market is mainly the working adults, it started its operation at late afternoon—3p.m. or 6p.m. It has music performances performed by Vertical Horizon, Hell’s Belles, 53A (Singapore), Beerfest All-Star Blues Band. There were also parties and DJ session by B-Yond VIP Club Night Mayfair, Power 98 JD Jensen Ho and DJ Samurai. There were also games at the sports bar such as foosball, pool and pinball machines.
As for Oktoberfest, as it is a recurring event, they target more on families. They start their festival in the morning—10am or at noon. They have programmes like ‘Grand entry of the Oktoberfest landlords and breweries’, ‘Oktoberfest Costume and Riflemen’s Parade’ and ‘Open-Air Oktoberfest Music’.
People—people in both beer festivals include workers, performers in the festival and the spectators who came for the event. For Beerfest Asia, the beer exhibitors recruited showgirls to help them in promoting their drinks. They also have DJs and other bands that gave live performances in the festival.
As for Oktoberfest, similarly to Beerfest Asia, its audiences are not only beer lovers, but also families. There are also performers performing in the parade. Tourists also came all the way to Germany for Oktoberfest too.
Partnerships—both festivals have partnered with sponsors to sponsor for their festivals. For Beerfest Asia, it has a wide range of sponsors to support them, from venue to music and performers to media and to ventilation.
Conversely, for Oktoberfest, as it is a public festival, the beer exhibitors support for their own tents.
Promotions—in order to attract people to come into the festivals, there must be certain promotions needed. Both festivals have come up with different ticket sales promotions for customers. There are early bird ticket promotions for those who are using the sponsor’s (Citibank) credit card for payment for people who are going for Beerfest Asia. Concession rates are also available for SAFRA members, senior citizens, tiertiary students and NSF members.
However, Oktoberfest does not have tickets sales promotion as the admission to the festival is free for public. They do reduce the price for all over Oktoberfest if families are visiting on the official family day, Tuesday from 12 noon to 6p.m.
Packaging and distribution—the tickets for Beerfest Asia are distributed island wide so that people could purchase them conveniently anywhere. They could either purchase their tickets online from Bytes Ticketing (http://www.bytes.sg) or from any outlets of O’Brien Sandwich Bars or Timbre Music Station. Beerfest Asia also packages itself with the local attraction as it is located near Singapore Flyer. Besides, those who bought the hospitality tickets are also entitled one free ride for the flyer.
As for Oktoberfest, it packages itself with spectacular large rides such as the Olympia Looping and Eurostar and also funfairs. Besides, it also packages itself with hotels for accommodation, so that tourists who are coming for Oktoberfest could enjoy the festival without worrying about the accommodation.
Price—instead of purchasing the beers straight from the vendors, consumers for both festivals were encouraged to buy the beer tokens as a substitute for currency. For Beerfest Asia, consumers need to purchase the currency booklet in order to purchase anything in the tent.
As for Oktoberfest, the companies hand out beer tokens to their guests, which can then be exchanged for beers in their respective tents.
Both festivals also have sales of merchandise such as mugs, T-shirts etc. Mugs are very popular souvenirs among visitors in Oktoberfest as they are made from heavy glass and have a decorative brewery logo on the side.
Festival Girl
7:23 PM
7:23 PM
