The archive · Marketing & Growth · Marketing decision · 2024–2025
DB Export Ultra's Cold Call Back Service lets Vanilla Ice save your frozen beer
New Zealanders who freeze their beer and forget it text 'ICE ICE' to 423, and 34 minutes later Vanilla Ice calls to remind them to take it out.
DB Breweries (Export Ultra)
What it had to solve
Over the previous 12 months, more than half of New Zealand had accidentally frozen a beer — millions of beers exploded in freezers every summer. DB Breweries and Special New Zealand turned the moment of forgetting into a reason to love Export Ultra, with Vanilla Ice as the brand's answering service.
How it works
Every New Zealand summer, beer drinkers put a bottle in the freezer to chill it fast — and forget it until it explodes. DB Breweries' own research found more than half of the country had frozen a beer by accident in the previous 12 months, meaning millions of beers lost to an 'unnecessary ice demise.' Export Ultra decided to solve the problem instead of just advertising around it.
The solution was the Export Ultra Cold Call Back Service, free of charge: put your beer in the freezer, text 'ICE ICE' to 423, and 34 minutes later Vanilla Ice himself calls to remind you to take it out before it blows. A launch film set in Vanilla Ice's Miami mansion showed him making the calls, and the service ran from December 2024 to February 2025 with more than 20 pre-recorded messages, holiday raps, and seasonal variations.
Special New Zealand led strategy, creative and production; Special PR drove earned communications; Dentsu Aotearoa handled media across TV, radio, digital audio, OOH and social; and Raydar brought the idea through the line in retail. The entire campaign went from concept to delivery in less than ten weeks.
The campaign generated over 234,000 interactions and lifted Export Ultra sales by 38% year-on-year during the period. The work collected the Audio & Radio Grand Prix at Spikes Asia 2025, a Silver Media Lion and Bronze PR Lion at Cannes Lions 2025, and a D&AD Pencil.
Why it lands
- The insight was national and physical: more than half of New Zealanders had frozen a beer by accident, so the service solved a problem everyone recognized.
- Vanilla Ice was not a celebrity endorsement but the mechanic of the idea — his name made the reminder service unforgettable and inherently shareable.
- A free utility with a 34-minute callback created real value, so the service itself generated the earned media: almost a quarter-million interactions came from sharing a genuinely useful reminder.
- Integration made it a campaign, not a stunt: TV, radio, social, PR and retail all delivered the same service from concept to delivery in under ten weeks.
What it did
The campaign generated over 234,000 interactions and lifted Export Ultra sales by 38% year-on-year during the campaign period. It won the Audio & Radio Grand Prix at Spikes Asia 2025, a Silver Media Lion and Bronze PR Lion at Cannes Lions 2025, and a D&AD Pencil.
What you can take
A great service idea can come from a universal accident: turning the frozen-beer moment into a call from Vanilla Ice made Export Ultra the hero — 234,000 interactions and a 38% sales lift followed.
Since then
The Cold Call Back Service ran through the New Zealand summer and returned twice at Cannes Lions 2025 — Silver in Media (Local Brand) and Bronze in PR (Best Use of Humour). Spikes Asia 2025 gave it the Audio & Radio Grand Prix, and D&AD awarded it a Pencil. For the industry it became a reference case for service-led humour: a campaign whose media plan was an extension of the product idea. DB Breweries' marketing director credited its origin in a deeply relatable Kiwi moment, and the agency pointed to the ten-week turnaround as proof that a strong PR-led idea can be built in a single summer.
Sources
- Special NZ and Export Ultra Win Two Cannes Lions for 'Cold Call Back'
- The Call Back Service — D&AD Awards archive
- Ice is back with a brand-new invention as Export Ultra + Special launch the Cold Call Back Service
- Vanilla Ice Helps Special Launch 'Cold Call Back Service' to Stop Beers Exploding in Freezer
- Spikes Asia announces its 2025 winners
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