3 Ways Campari America Builds Brand Loyalty With Live Experiences

Campari America is placing its spirits brands inside the occasions people already plan to share.

Aperol appeared at Coachella and on Hilary Duff’s "The Lucky Me Tour," while Campari Spritz Square expanded from New York to Miami and Los Angeles.

The push arrives as Americans drink less and choose their occasions more carefully.

IWSR counted a 4% drop in U.S. beverage alcohol servings between 2024 and 2025.

Per-capita consumption across the 10 markets IWSR tracks most closely is down 20% since 2000.

"Consumers may be drinking less, but they’re placing greater value on the occasions they choose to celebrate, looking for quality over quantity and being selective about brands and experiences that feel meaningful," Allison Varone, head of marketing at Campari America, shares.

Three rules govern how the company picks its occasions.

In this DesignRush interview, Varone explains how Aperol claims an existing one, why the company passes on popular partners, and what she measures.

Who Is Allison Varone?

Allison leads a portfolio of brands at Campari America, where she previously served as vice president of channel and customer marketing.

She has more than 20 years of experience driving growth, market share, and profitability across large and small brands.

Before Campari, Allison spent nearly a dozen years at LVMH, leading marketing teams and brands including Hennessy, Moët & Chandon, and Belvedere.

She began her career in publishing at Time Inc. and Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia.

1. Own the Ritual People Already Keep

The Italian aperitivo gives Campari America a ritual suited to more intentional drinking.

"Aperitivo isn't about rushing to what's next, but taking the time to enjoy company and conversation over an Aperol Spritz or Campari Spritz," Varone says.

She frames the U.S. rollout as an answer to demand that already exists.

"Campari America has been working to infiltrate stateside as consumers increasingly seek intentional moments and offline connection."

The pre-dinner meet-up, the patio drink, the concert arrival, and the slow start to a summer evening all give the portfolio a clear social role.

"Aperol is much more than a spirits brand; it's a lifestyle brand," Varone points out.

"Because of this, offering experiences alongside food, music and cultural moments is a natural extension of who we are."

Festivals, concerts, and city activations let consumers practice the ritual in real time.

At Coachella, the Aperol Day Club puts the Spritz at the center of the festival experience, and the Hilary Duff partnership applies the same idea at venue level.

Aperol runs Spritz Day Club pre-show gatherings in select U.S. tour markets under its "Share the Moment" platform.

"Each experience that Aperol creates in cities across the country allows the brand to lean into the power of live music to foster community, spark new connections, and create shared moments," Varone says.

Brand strategy gets easier when the product owns the first drink of the night, a habit slot that's hard to take back once something else occupies it.

"When someone has a great experience at a Campari America event, they're likely to share it, talk about it, and build an emotional connection. 

That can translate to long-term brand loyalty, and ultimately, brand advocacy."

Aperitivo belongs to no single brand, which is the catch in owning a ritual.

Brand positioning comes down to which drink consumers picture without being prompted.

2. Make Popularity Pass the Fit Test

Cultural opportunities move fast, so Varone starts with brand fit.

"We don't pursue opportunities simply because they're popular," she explains.

"Instead, we evaluate whether the experience reinforces the role we want the brand to play in consumers' lives and whether it reflects the values and heritage that make the brand distinctive."

Duff cleared the test on her own record, having name-dropped Aperol in "Adult Size Medium" months before the sponsorship was announced.

"We seek partners and opportunities that align with our values, and that help us bring the Aperol experience to life in a meaningful way," Varone says.

"Hilary was a particularly exciting fit because the partnership feels incredibly genuine."

Campari applied the same test to its own audience.

"For the past few years, Campari built equity through a dedication to programming centered around film and the arts," Varone shares.

That work reached an aspirational VIP crowd through the Cannes Film Festival, the Venice Film Festival, the SAG Awards, and the New York Film Festival.

"As we prepared to amplify the Campari Spritz in the U.S. in 2025, we saw an opportunity to elevate the platform and shifted towards more community-driven executions to fuel recruitment," she says.

Campari Spritz Square debuted in 2025 with a takeover of Manhattan's Lower East Side and Chinatown.

The second year expanded to Miami's Design District in March 2026 and Silver Lake in Los Angeles in June 2026.

"This pivot in programming gave us the opportunity to grow from a brand that consumers admired from afar, to one that they could experience firsthand in their own communities," Varone says.

Fit tests protect the real reason for the brand to be in the room.

Brand partnerships hold up when the audience can name the connection without being told.

3. Treat Attendance as Table Stakes

Varone sorts event metrics into two tiers.

"Attendance and social reach are always measured, but they're considered table stakes," she says.

"We've moved beyond traditional metrics to focus instead on indicators of consumer interest and brand love. 

These include "event ticket sell-out speed, number of drinks sold, onsite sampling, sentiment, and earned conversation across media and social channels."

Campari Spritz Square, which was "a huge success," gave her the benchmark. Tickets to the New York debut were sold out in minutes.

The second tier decides whether the event mattered.

"Ultimately, we're looking for signals that the experience resonated and transcended the event itself," Varone reveals.

"Did people talk about it? Did it generate quality earned coverage? Did our partners want to participate again?"

Sell-out speed is really a capacity signal, since a room that clears in minutes means it was undersized.

Experiential marketing budgets get easier to defend when a brand can show demand it failed to meet.

The Mistake CMOs Keep Making

Varone opens her advice to other CMOs with a diagnosis:

"A common mistake is confusing cultural participation with cultural relevance. 

Consumers can sniff out when a brand is showing up authentically versus trying to be part of the conversation."

"The goal isn't to show up everywhere. The true purpose is to show up where your brand naturally belongs, with relevance and a unique and ownable story," she adds.

Her fix starts with the asset a brand already owns.

"My best advice is to protect what makes your brand distinguished," Varone says.

"A brand's cultural heritage is an advantage to be adapted and leveraged, so don't abandon it in pursuit of the next trend."

Protecting a brand asset takes agencies that know it well enough to defend it.

"We look for partners that understand our brand inside and out, who can serve as true brand guardians, while simultaneously driving us toward new opportunities and frontiers," she shares.

Campari's "Stay Bitter" campaign shows what this kind of balance produces.

For Negroni Week 2025, Campari and its agency partners made bitterness, the brand's most divisive trait, its main selling point.

"Together, we transformed bitterness from a flavor profile into a cultural statement about authenticity and individuality," Varone reveals.

"[We] created a rallying cry that encouraged consumers to dare to be different and join us in harnessing their own bitter side to fuel excellence."

The Stay Bitter Capsule Collection put Sarah Michelle Gellar at the front, selling apparel from $40 to $70.

A portion of the proceeds went to the Slow Food Negroni Week Fund, which Campari seeded with $100,000.

Brand identity gets stronger when a company defends the trait that some customers reject.

Every rule in Varone's approach protects a brand with a role people recognize. Heritage brands can build it three ways:

• Anchor the product to a standing habit. A drink becomes memorable when it joins an occasion people already schedule in without prompting.
• Screen every partner for a credible link. The audience should be able to name why the brand belongs there before the spend scales.
• Read the signals the event leaves behind. Sell-out speed, repeat partner interest, and earned conversation show whether attendance turned into preference.

Campari America is treating loyalty as something it earns by hosting the occasion, not by interrupting it.

Remember that the math holds only when the night is good enough to repeat, which puts the burden on the experience itself.