Behind Cantera Negra Tequila’s Cinematic Brand Marketing Debut
Deutsch Family Wine and Spirits’ 2022 acquisition of Cantera Negra combined a well-regarded but small tequila brand with a parent known for brand-building. Their first ad campaign together features a fantastical, spaghetti-Western world where a cowgirl shakes a cocktail on horseback while dodging falling volcanic rock.
The cinematic creative from Colossus marks the first brand advertising campaign for Cantera Negra, a small-batch tequila with four varieties priced at $50 or more. While it has a growing presence in tequila bars and high-end liquor stores, many consumers will encounter it for the first time through its ads.
The ads are running on Meta and YouTube in New York, New Jersey and Texas—markets where Cantera Negra has its strongest commercial presence.
Deutsch is famous for Josh Cellars wines, the approachable wine brand that has been growing steadily. It has enjoyed a burst of attention on social media this year, thanks in part to a viral social post that compared it favorably to its low-priced competitors Stella Rosa and Barefoot Wines.
While Dan Kleinman, chief brand officer at Deutsch, concedes that there are many differences between Josh and Cantera Negra, he also notes that they share key characteristics: both brands showed strong sales early on and were seen by Deutsch as having the potential for distinction.
“That’s our mission with every brand that we have.” Kleinman said. “First, to bring on or create very fit-to-fight propositions, and then focus on building great consumer meaning with those brands, so that consumers come to love them as they’ve come to love Josh.”
Cantera Country
Although its growth rate has slowed considerably, tequila remains one of the bright spots in a sluggish spirits business, said Kleinman. The category grew 6.4% by volume and 7.9% in dollars year-to-date through Nov. 30, according to Nielsen figures from industry trade journal Shanken News Daily. Competition among high-end brands is fierce as the premiumization trend slows. “You’ve got a ton of strong, well-established brands above 50 bucks and as well as a lot of other upstart craft players making real headway,” Kleinman said. “So I think the category is really heating up as we head into the holidays, and it’s remaining one of the best-performing segments in all spirits.”
This big field has produced a lot of marketing tropes, including celebrity endorsements, shot after shot of farmers and similar aerial landscapes, said Travis Robertson, executive creative director and co-founder of Colossus. They won’t be found in what Robertson calls “Cantera Country,” or the world into which viewers of Cantera Negra ads are transported.
“It’s something that feels a little bit more imaginative, that’s got one foot in reality and one foot in fantasy,” Robertson said. The goal is to build that world over time and develop something “that feels much different than what you’re seeing from anybody else,” Robertson said.
Rather than a traditional male protagonist, Cantera instead highlights an enigmatic female spokesperson played by the Mexican actor Lucía Gómez-Robledo of “How to Survive Being Single.”
“If you look at the category, there’s a lot of mustachioed, very serious men that look like they should be smoking cigars in a lounge somewhere,” Robertson said. “We wanted to use a really strong woman, someone who had some bravado.”
In the ads, directed by Joachim Back, Gómez-Robledo travels between the chaotic fantasy world of Cantera Country—and a sophisticated barroom where the chaos is only a painting in the background.
“I think she did it without going over the top in any way—there was kind of a sophistication, an authoritative stance,” Kleinman said. “If you have volcanoes crashing all around you, and you need to talk intelligently about tequila, you need a special kind of a lead. We felt she was perfect for it.”
Her message about the tequila quality highlights the volcanic soil in which its agave plants grow, a product attribute brand leaders felt would intrigue potential customers. Cantera Negra means “black quarry.”
Robertson said the quality of the marketing work is meant to parallel the brand. For example, ad backgrounds were hand-painted in Prague using matte painting, a Hollywood practice where backdrops are pained on massive stretched canvases.
“What we wanted to do is use the craft of advertising—the artistry of what we do—to parallel the craft of the tequila, rather than being so literal and overt with describing every single product point, which is what you see quite often,” Robertson said. “And I think for consumers, sometimes that results in a master class on a spirits brand they never asked for.”
Deutsch Family Wines and Spirits appointed Colossus over the summer to develop marketing for Cantera Negra and its gin brand Gray Whale.
“Salience and relevance are the key metrics we’re looking at,” Kleinman said. “This is our first big push into driving distinction and top-of-mind awareness for the brand. So that’s really how we’re judging this work, and that, you know, people got to get curious and want to try this, as you know, something of a step up from what they normally drink in the category.”