Grupo Modelo Campaign to Promote the Druid Impairment App in Mexico

The campaign is part of its continuing efforts to reduce alcohol-impaired driving in the State of Zacatecas.

Grupo Modelo, an Anheuser-Busch InBev company, will be launching a campaign to promote the Druid® impairment app in Zacatecas, Mexico as part of its continuing efforts to reduce alcohol-impaired driving in the State of Zacatecas.

CAMBRIDGE, MA, August 10, 2021 - We are pleased to announce that Grupo Modelo, an Anheuser-Busch InBev company, will be launching a campaign to promote the Druid® impairment app in Zacatecas, Mexico as part of its continuing efforts to reduce alcohol-impaired driving in the State of Zacatecas. Impairment Science, Inc. (ISI) announced today that Grupo Modelo is jumpstarting its campaign by purchasing user licenses for 20,000 adults who can download Druid free of charge for a one-year subscription. The minimum legal drinking age in Mexico is 18.

The first 20,000 subscribers to download Druid will be able to use the app an unlimited number of times for 12 months, making it possible for them to develop the routine of checking their impairment level before deciding to drive or engage in other potentially risky activities.

“We want our customers to have a positive experience with Corona and our other products, and that includes getting home safely,” explained Juan Manuel Rosales, Grupo Modelo’s Corporate Social Responsibility Manager. “That is why, for several years, we have supported roadside sobriety checkpoints and other enforcement efforts to combat alcohol-impaired driving in Zacatecas. With even tougher measures being put in place, we will be marketing Druid to get people who have been out drinking to test themselves before they choose to drive home.” The promotional campaign will use the slogan “Chécate con Druid” (Check Yourself with Druid).

Among those tougher measures will be more frequently scheduled roadside sobriety checkpoints and the opening this fall of a new “civic center” in Zacatecas for detaining arrested drivers whose blood alcohol concentration (BrAC) is 0.09% (0.40 mg/L or higher) and for conducting next-morning hearings before a magistrate.

Grupo Modelo’s new campaign is part of AB InBev’s Global Smart Drinking Goals (GSDGs) initiative to reduce alcohol harms by 10 percent, an objective that matches the World Health Organization’s announced target. Zacatecas is one of six cities where AB InBev set up a City Pilot project to combat underage and binge drinking, alcohol-related violence, and alcohol-impaired driving. After starting the City Pilot, Grupo Modelo has continued to collaborate with the AB InBev Foundation to manage all six City Pilots.

“Our goal is to encourage people to take responsibility for protecting themselves, as well as their family and friends, by providing a tool to help them make better choices,” said Elena Cardenas, who directs the Zacatecas City Pilot for the Foundation. “If someone has been out drinking, the test will provide the information they need to do the right thing, whether that’s waiting until their impairment level goes back down or arranging for a safe ride home. Better yet, Druid will show that they’ve practiced what AB InBev calls ‘smart drinking’ and aren’t demonstrably impaired.”

To promote Druid, Grupo Modelo will be producing wallet-sized cards with information about the app and the download link. After the free subscriptions have been given out, additional subscribers can download the app for free for 30 days, after which they will be charged only $1.99 USD per month or $14.99 per year. Police officers will give a card to every driver who goes through a roadside sobriety checkpoint, even if they have not been drinking.

The card will also be distributed by bartenders and waitstaff who work at bars and restaurants participating in Zacatecas’ new Responsible Beverage Service program, as well as by the hospital and clinic staff who have been assigned to ask patients, whatever the reason for their visit might be, a set of alcohol screening questions as part of the City Pilot’s recently launched Screening and Brief Intervention program. An online screening test promoted on social media will also introduce Druid.

“The whole idea behind these City Pilot programs is that the successful ones can be replicated and launched all over Mexico and then globally,” stated Cardenas. “My hope is that we are so successful that Grupo Modelo will decide to support additional free subscriptions as the company expands its prevention efforts to other Mexican cities. I think people will find the app to be to be a useful and practical tool, but also fun to use, and given the low price, I expect it to catch on in a big way.”