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Think across all of the iconic partnerships and sponsorships within Diageo’s brand portfolio… which are the longest-running and most beloved? It’s a big question. Guinness and rugby? Perhaps back into the days of Johnnie Walker and Formula One?
Do a little research and you’ll find that the country and brand that has engaged in the longest and most “loyal” partnerships is, perhaps unsurprisingly, Ireland and Guinness – for example, the Cork Jazz Festival, which the brand has headline-sponsored since 1982.
However, dig a little deeper and you’ll find a Diageo-owned non-Guinness, Irish proposition that is the very definition of a great partnership.
Travel to Virginia, Co Cavan in Ireland, each August and you will find yourself at the Virginia Show, where the day closes each year with the Diageo Baileys Champion Cow Competition – an event that has continued with the same sponsors since its foundation 41 years ago and is beloved by industry, community and indeed politicians alike. “The Baileys” as it is known is in these circles, is iconic.
The agriculture industry is very important to the Irish economy, with livestock breeding and dairy farming a key plank of that. And the event has become a supreme showcase and one at which leading politicians wish to be seen.
This 21 August, the date of the 2024 competition, you could barely do much better, with the Taioseach (Prime Minister) Simon Harris in attendance, amidst much publicity, as well as Heather Humphreys, Minister for Rural and Community Development.
Mr Harris spent the morning of the competition meeting farming family entrants, members of the industry and key representatives of the co-sponsors – Baileys and its cream supplier Tirlán – as well as being pictured brushing down a few of the contestant cows!
The competition has come a long way from its roots.
It was back in 1983 that the parent body of Irish Agricultural shows created the competition through an agreement with Baileys Irish Cream liqueur and its milk partner at the facility in Virginia, now owned by Tirlán.
Each year since, cow breeders from the island of Ireland compete to win prizes that reward excellence in quality milk production and “all aspects of functional cow confirmation”.
It perhaps doesn’t hold the glamour of other Diageo partnerships or activations - such Guinness and the Premier League or Don Julio 1942 on the Strip in Las Vegas at the Super Bowl. But in fact, this partnership has - for more than four decades - encapsulated so much of what a great partnership should be: promotion and support for a local industry, promotion and support of local communities, and most importantly for Baileys, highlighting the sheer quality of one of its key ingredients – the cream.
The cream for Baileys comes largely from Tirlán’s site in Virginia, Co Cavan, and every year, roughly 200 million litres of fresh local milk, from 41,000 cows is processed to produce the cream used in the production of Baileys.
Therefore, the competition allows Diageo and Baileys to give back to the local communities and family-owned farms that create the hero ingredient for the world’s most-loved liqueur.
Robert Murphy, Head of Baileys Operations, says Diageo has nothing but pride in the partnership:
This is one of the longest running pedigree dairy livestock competitions within the Irish circuit, where Irish farming families are platformed on a national stage for the dedication and passion they put into the work they, and generations before them have carried out. The competition is steeped in history, and we’re glad to be part of that history having sponsored the competition for over 40 years, alongside our partners, Tirlán. With each year that passes, we grow more and more proud of our place in giving back to farming communities – many of whom provide Diageo with the key ingredient for world’s most loved liquor, Baileys Original Irish Cream.”
What is most interesting is that while Diageo and Baileys continue to be proud of the association, the competition itself is utterly beloved. Over the last 41 years the competition has become a blue riband event. To those in livestock breeding and dairy production circles, breeding a Diageo Baileys Champion is what every top Holstein Friesian breeder on the island of Ireland aspires to achieve.
Indeed, this year’s winning farmer, Padraic Greenan from Co Monaghan, was utterly effusive in his pride and praise: “It’s an unreal feeling. You always imagine days like today – for when I used to come here as a kid and you looked at the cows your first impression was, imagine having a cow in the ring. It’s unreal. It’s just a thing you imagine of and then today it’s happened. We’re a real family team and it’s a great feeling for us all.
“As far as shows go, “The Baileys” is the cream of the crop, it really is.”