Ryan Reynolds is killing it right now.

No, not as Deadpool — though that’s obviously going well for him. I’m talking about his success in advertising. Just two years after becoming co-owner of Aviation Gin, he sold the brand to spirits giant Diageo in 2020 for 610 Million, with more money on the table if the brand does well in the coming years. Not only is Reynolds the spokesman for the brand, he’s also the creative director and the content producer — the man is doing it all. He’s quickly making a name for himself in the space and providing a roadmap for what other brands can do to stand out.

With retail sales topping an estimated $90 billion in 2019 according to the Distilled Spirits Council of the United States (DISCUS), the distilled spirits industry is growing and becoming ever more crowded. From the well established companies like Bacardi and Campari with huge marketing budgets all the way down to small batch independent distillers, each brand is looking to steal market share a cut of that $90 billion, making it difficult to break into the field and find success. Aviation Gin, in just a few short years, has broken through the noise and figured out how to reach their target audience and resonate with them. Below I’ve outlined a few thoughts as to why Reynolds and Aviation Gin are finding so much success in a field that’s typically difficult to stand out in and tough to navigate.

Celebrity Spokesperson

Let’s get this out of the way first — it’s the most obvious contributor to his success in advertising and his brands are undoubtedly benefiting from his celebrity status. A study, conducted by Anita Elberse of Harvard Business School, “The Economic Value of Celebrity Endorsements”, showed that approximately 20% of all advertising features a celebrity, that celebrity endorsements increase trust, and that brands can experience a 20–40% increase by using a celebrity endorsement. Not only is he a celebrity but I believe he’s the right type of celebrity to make a good spokesman — likable, not very controversial, funny, and well known across a multitude of demographics — all of which help him connect well with Aviation’s audience.

Speed and Efficiency

Typically in advertising it takes months of planning with rounds of back and forth between the agency and client before a commercial is ready to go live. Being that Reynolds is the creative director and the client, he’s able to remove many of the roadblocks that can hamstring the process of developing creative content, allowing him to get from initial idea to production- ready with astonishing speed. He also owns the production company that produces the commercials, gaining even more efficiency. What all this all boils down to is the streamlining of his production process. This allows Aviation Gin to be much more agile and seize the momentum of consumer conversations.

A great example of this streamlined production process paying off is when Aviation Gin landed that well placed jab at the controversial Peloton commercial. In the Peloton ad an already thin woman receives a Peloton exercise bike from her husband for Christmas and records herself every day for year taking on the exercise challenges. It was widely received as sexist, dystopian, and tone deaf because the ad made it seem as though the husband was guilting his fit wife into losing weight. Reynolds saw this as an opportunity to join the conversation while the controversy was swirling and produced his own commercial which was released mere days after the Peloton ad originally aired. In his Aviation Gin spot, Reynolds hires the same actress, Monica Ruiz, we see her sitting at a bar with a couple of her friends staring into the camera with a dazed look on her face. After a moment she takes a sip of her martini and says “This gin is really smooth”, her friends nod and offer to buy her another round and say “You’re safe here”. The ad was funny, it was timely, and it capitalized on the cultural moment. The ad has since been viewed over 7 Million times and catapulted Aviation Gin into the spotlight, got us all talking about it, and Reynolds himself didn’t even appear in it.

Authenticity

Another key driver of Reynolds’ success in advertising is his authenticity. Why does authenticity matter? It’s because brands that are authentic and consistent in their message do a better job of building trust with consumers, which in turn leads to more sales and more loyalty from their customers. A recent study found that 86 percent of consumers say that authenticity is a key factor when deciding what brands they like and support, and that 81 percent of consumers said they need to be able to trust a brand in order to buy from them (Stackla 2019). For years we’ve seen Reynolds take roles where he plays characters that seem to be an extension of his own personality; Two Guys a Girl and a Pizza Place, Van Wilder, Deadpool, etc. — they are always funny, quick witted, a bit self-deprecating but still very sure of themselves. He seamlessly brings those same traits to his commercials, print ads and social posts, so not only does this make consumers feel as if they know him personally but the consistency in the way he talks to the consumer through his ads builds trust with them as well.

A lot can be learned from Ryan Reynolds and Aviation Gin’s advertising success — it’s practically a case study on a brand’s ability to be extremely nimble and how that has allowed them to capitalize on cultural moments. Aviation Gin is able to create nimble and relevant content not just because they have such a streamlined production process, but because their brand communications are always rooted in the brand’s core values. So often in a typical client-agency structure crucial time is lost in rounds of revisions that tend to dilute the original idea. Brands can avoid this bottleneck and gain focus, efficiency, and relevance by developing greater trust with their agency. If the brand and agency are aligned on the brand purpose and comms strategy you can build trust; with trust you can move at pace without sacrificing authenticity; speed + authenticity = relevant, successful content, allowing the brand to strike while the iron is hot and seize the moment when it arises.

Of course if you are a if you are a funny, authentic, and a ridiculously good-looking celebrity spokesperson with your own brands and production company, you too could kill it. What’s next for Ryan Reynolds? Who knows, but I’ll be looking forward to seeing his future ads as he continues to gain his footing in this industry. I may even have to grab myself a bottle of Aviation Gin to watch.