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November 2006 - Strategy Magazine
Who to Watch

Rock solid: Labatt's Stéphane Boulay
How Labatt's Stéphane Boulay has managed to retain Budweiser's number one position in Quebec and help grow Bud Light along the way

by Annette Bourdeau
page 16

Charting new territory doesn't faze Stéphane Boulay. From launching his own business fresh out of university to testing old-fashioned flipbook techniques on Montreal's Métro for Budweiser, Labatt Canada's marketing integration manager for Quebec injects his entrepreneurial spirit into whatever he's doing. "I don't like always doing the same thing," says Boulay, 36.

Since joining Labatt in 2002 as brand solutions manager for Bud in Quebec, Boulay has helped it attain its spot as the number one beer in the province for the last two years. Also under his leadership, the Quebec activation of the 2005 national relaunch of Bud Light truly resonated with Quebecers, and helped the brand boost its sales by 100%-130% this year. "He knows the Quebec market very well," notes John Gallagher, EVP at BBDO Montreal. "He's got this sixth sense about what will work."

Much of Boulay's drive to know the Quebec market and try new things can be credited to his four-year stint working with a partner to launch and run their own tour business right after Boulay graduated from Université de Montréal with a business administration degree. They were taking on competitors like Air Transat but made a significant dent in the market share, even winning a Tourism Gold Award from the Quebec government in 1999 for best marketing/sales actions in international markets.

Boulay says a big lesson he took from the experience was accountability. "When you make a decision when you have your own business, it's on your shoulders." After deciding he wanted to move to a bigger company, Boulay joined Club Med as a commercial director, where Labatt was one of his clients. After a year with Club Med, he jumped to Labatt because he thought it would be a great challenge to work in such a competitive category.

During his four years managing the Bud and Bud Light brands in Quebec (he now has a more senior strategic planning role for all of the Labatt brands in Quebec), Boulay focused on grassroots initiatives to make the iconic American brand relevant for Quebecers, like sponsoring university football teams and sports shows on RDS. And, when it comes to the big stuff, like leveraging the brand's North American sponsorship of the NFL, he makes sure to customize it for the market.

"With the Superbowl, we did 250 executions in the field in Quebec, with some retail on top of that. The brand is really active," he says. His boss, Rob McCarthy, director, core premium brands for Labatt Breweries of Canada, says he's impressed by Boulay's entrepreneurial spirit. "He has an incredible drive to get things done. He never says no, and he always delivers."

McCarthy points to Boulay's efforts leading the Quebec activation of Budweiser's sponsorship of Montreal's Grand Prix du Canada as particularly well executed. Boulay faced a unique challenge when he first signed on for 2004 because, along with Bud Quebec sponsoring, Budweiser International, was sponsoring one of the F1 teams, BMW Williams. "The challenge was to find a good balance between...a local brand sponsorship for an international event in Quebec, and an international sponsorship from Anheuser-Busch for an F1 team, which was also another good opportunity for activation," Boulay recalls.

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