THINK Campaign - Mates Matter is enhanced

25 February 2020

THINK! has launched a campaign calling on young men to intervene and ‘Pint Block’ their mates. The campaign uses social and online video, and messaging in pubs, bars and sports clubs, to bring the message to life through a series of humorous and surreal interventions. This follows a move in recent years to focus THINK! activity on young men aged 17-24, who are 4 times more likely to be killed or seriously injured on the road than drivers aged 25 or over.

Now THINK! has commissioned a series of illustrations to highlight how the power of friendship can encourage safer driving.

Launched in December 2019, the Pint Block campaign encourages young men to step in and stop a friend from drinking alcohol if they are intending to drive.

In UK 60 car drivers aged 17-24 are killed or injured, on average each month, while found to be driving over the legal alcohol limit.

• while there has been a long-term reduction in drink driving since 1979, there are still around 1,600 alcohol-related deaths and serious injuries on the roads in Great Britain every year
• despite this, more than a third of us don’t think it’s important to intervene if a friend is planning to drink and drive. This drops to less than half of young males
• to address this, THINK! has launched a ground-breaking campaign – Pint Block – which urges young men to step in and ‘Pint Block"

Pint Block builds on THINK’s award-winning Mates Matter campaign which saw the biggest shift in more than a decade in young men’s attitudes towards drink-driving. The campaign is being rolled out with the support of partners including the County FA through its grassroots football clubs, Heineken Zero, Drinkaware and insurethebox which specialises in black box insurance for young drivers. The campaign was created in collaboration with marketing agency VMLY&R.Block’ their mates, with the message that ‘a mate doesn’t let a mate drink drive’