The archive · Marketing & Growth · Marketing decision · 2021
Heineken's 'Night is Young' film makes vaccinated seniors the envy of Gen Z clubbers
The film opens on a wild club night and reveals the dancers are vaccinated seniors, pitching the jab as the ticket back to summer fun.
Heineken
What it had to solve
In summer 2021, as Europe's bars and clubs reopened, the vaccinated — a group that skewed older — could return to nightlife, while the film's Millennial and Gen Z audience risked missing the summer fun. Heineken's global brief was to speak to that crowd about vaccination without sounding like a public-service announcement.
How it works
In the summer of 2021, as bars and clubs reopened across Europe, the vaccinated could return to nightlife while many Millennial and Gen Z drinkers risked missing the summer. Heineken answered with a global brand film, 'The Night is Young,' encouraging that younger crowd to get vaccinated so they would not miss out.
The film opens like a typical club ad: neon lights, dancing, flirting, drinks and a party that runs until sunrise. Partway through it reveals that the revellers are senior citizens who have been vaccinated and are reclaiming their youth, closing on the tagline 'the night belongs to the vaccinated.' Directed by Ali Ali under COVID safety restrictions, with Publicis Italy and Le Pub guiding, it made vaccination the price of admission to the fun.
The campaign got the reaction it courted: thousands of comments on YouTube, many hostile, plus boycott calls from anti-vaxxers, while trade coverage noted the strategy of handing the party back to the vaccinated. Heineken's work entered the D&AD 2022 awards archive as a brand taking a public-health message to the people it concerned.
Why it lands
- It inverted the usual vaccine appeal: instead of duty, the film sold desire, showing what the vaccinated get to do.
- The mid-film reveal — club kids become seniors — delivered the point in seconds and made the film rewatchable.
- Heineken spoke in its own voice to young nightlife audiences who tune out official health messaging.
- The tagline 'the night belongs to the vaccinated' gave the campaign a line people could argue about, which is how it spread.
What it did
Instead of a lecture, the film handed younger audiences an image of what vaccination unlocks, and it spread: thousands of YouTube comments and boycott calls from anti-vaxxers showed the message landed loudly, while the work entered the D&AD 2022 awards archive.
What you can take
Make the desired behaviour aspirational instead of lecturing: young drinkers were never told to get jabbed, only shown the night that waits for the vaccinated.
Since then
Heineken posted the minute-long film on YouTube on 8 July 2021, where it drew thousands of comments, many hostile: anti-vaxxers threatened a boycott and filmed themselves pouring Heineken down drains. The campaign still entered the D&AD 2022 awards archive, which records the film and its tagline, 'the night belongs to the vaccinated.'
Sources
- The Night is Young | D&AD awards archive
- The Old Are Young Again: Heineken Shows What Vaccinated People Get up to at Night
- Anti-vaxxers call for Heineken boycott over new ad
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