Responsible Party

Objective

The programme has two main goals:

To raise awareness among young adults about the risk of drinking too much alcohol;
To reduce alcohol related harm during events for young adults.

Description

The Responsible Party prevention programme was created in 2009. The partnership with Erasmus Student Network was signed for the first time in September 2010 in the presence of the ESN President and Pernod Ricard’s CEO Pierre Pringuet. This cooperation does not imply a commercial relationship. The partnership agreement has been renewed each year since 2010, to keep up the momentum and people motivated. In September 2020, it was signed for the 11th time.

Onsite: Student parties are run by the local ESN student association with local Pernod Ricard affiliates providing support, information and tools (posters, information flyers etc). Simple rules for the parties include: no open bars, no free alcoholic drinks and no advertising of the party based on alcohol and its price.

Before parties, the Responsible Party programme works with ESN to provide workshops and training for ESN volunteers (Responsible Party Ambassadors), who are the partygoer’s peers. The approach takes advantage of the efficacy of the peer-to-peer approach in relaying messages.
During the party, the Responsible Party Ambassadors (Good Vibes Squad) talk to students about enjoying parties responsibly, offer advice on responsible consumption and distribute water, gadgets and information. They also run surveys to evaluate the visibility of the programme and use the occasion for additional peer to peer communication on responsible drinking.

Online: Responsible Party operated onsite at student events until January 2020. Since then, physical events have been unable to take place due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, in April 2020, a digital tool was developed, the programme visuals were updated and a new tagline #makegoodtimesunforgettable was introduced. The online element includes:

Social media activities: Instagram and Facebook are used to interact and engage with young adults on topics including responsible drinking, to spread positive messages and to empower young adults to make the responsible choices.
Responsible Party e-learning platform: Developed with EdApp, the fun and informative e-learning platform gives young adults information about alcohol and its effects, binge drinking and how to have responsible parties. Participants sign up before accessing the course. It has two modules: Introduction to Responsible Party and Binge Drinking. A hidden third module was specifically developed for the Responsible Party Ambassadors which will be available to them once onsite events can take place again. The course is available in English, French and Spanish.
The dedicated website was updated and contains information about Responsible Party, tips for a responsible lifestyle, an “about alcohol” section, a link to the e-learining platform, and “Good Vibes” wall video page.

The first social media campaign “#Sharinggoodvibes” ran between April and June 2020. It directly referenced the COVID-19 situation and provided positive messages, stories about solidarity and conviviality, in addition to raising awareness of a responsible lifestyle. Activities included:

Regular Facebook and Instagram posts.
A series of uplifting and fun video interviews with guest stars. Two lots of videos were made: “Sharing Good Vibes for a Responsible Lifestyle”, where guests answered questions and gave their views on feeling empowered whilst having a responsible lifestyle and “Ride the Good Vibes”, where guests answered questions about how they share good vibes and enjoy a responsible lifestyle.
A Responsible Party concert with DJ Licious in May and a Sharing Good Vibes concert held during the “Sharing Good Vibes week” of 15-19 June.

In addition, ESN and Responsible Party have held several e-learning challenges and competitions to encourage participation from Erasmus students.

Whilst new online activities are planned for 2021, once physical events can take place again, they will continue. The onsite and online elements will then take place together to ensure that the message can be reached by more and more young adults.

Partners

Erasmus Student Newtork (ESN)

Results

The social media campaign (Facebook & Instagram) reached over 6.7 million young adults between April 2020 and December 2020. Posts received 9.6 million impressions and 2.3 million people engaged with them. Also, the Instagram page has over 1,100 followers and the Facebook has over 5,300 “likes” and over 5,500 followers.

Until January 2020: More than 500 Responsible Parties have reached more than 470,000 students in 33 countries including Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, The Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

Measurement & evaluation

Evaluation took place between August 2016 and July 2017 (30,400 responses from 32 countries) to assesses the alcohol consumption habits among European students and evaluate the perception and the appreciation of the RP programme by students attending the events. Key findings include:

88.8% said that Responsible Party is a useful programme.
52.6% agreed that it raised awareness about alcohol consumption
74.5% said the responsible drinking message was clear and useful.
61.4% said they had changed their drinking habits as a result.
Among students who drank alcohol, a global decrease of both AUDIT and Binge Drinking scores between the beginning and end of the academic year was observed.