sales. Today, Guinness' principal television campaign in North America consists of limited animation commercials featuring two eccentric scientists in 19th-century dress complimenting one another's ideas as "brilliant!" Absolut Absolut vodka is made in Sweden and was introduced to the United States in the year 1979. Its launch was a true challenge due to a variety of factors: Sweden was not perceived as a vodka-producing country, the bottle was very awkward for bartenders to use, and vodka was perceived as a cheap, tasteless drink. Absolut's advertising campaign by TBWA exploited the shape of the bottle to create clever advertisements that caused people to become involved in the advertising, and the brand took off. Before Absolut, there were very few distinctions in the vodka category. Today there are regular, premium, and superpremium vodkas each at different price points and qualities. Flavoured vodka varieties have become numerous and may be found commonly in stores in the U.S.A. Alcohol sponsorship in sport Sport has been suggested to be one of the primary, if not the dominant, medium for the promotion of alcohol and drinking to the general population with the majority of advertising spend an advertising placement occurring in sport. Work from New Zealand and Australia shows that sponsorship of sports participants or athletes is associated with more hazardous drinking, with calls from the UK, Australia, and New Zealand, for bans on alcohol industry sponsorship and advertising in sport. See also Group Against Liquor Advertising (GALA) (in New Zealand) Cannabis advertising References Further reading Two articles among many are Effects of Alcohol Advertising Exposure on Drinking Among Youth, Snyder et al., Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med/ Vol 160, Jan 2006 pg. 18-24 and Exposure to Television Ads and Subsequent Adolescent Alcohol Use, Stacy et al., American Journal of Health Behavior, Nov-Dec 2004, pg. 498–509. To view the literature go to pubmed.gov and search for alcohol advertising and adolescent behavior or some iteration of this. These articles and related studies are reviewed in J.P. Nelson, "What is Learned from Longitudinal Studies of Advertising and Youth Drinking and Smoking?" International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 7(3), March 2010, pp. 870–926. Open Access: What is Learned from Longitudinal Studies of Advertising and Youth Drinking and Smoking? A Critical Assessment; and J.P. Nelson, "Alcohol Marketing, Adolescent Drinking, and Publication Bias in Longitudinal Studies: A Critical Survey using Meta-Analysis," Journal of Economic Surveys, 25(2), April 2011, pp. 191–232.