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Don Julio Tequila Writes Mexico a Cinematic Love Letter
Don Julio Tequila's "A Love Letter to Mexico" is a 2023 cinematic film campaign created by Anomaly New York that positions the brand as a cultural expression of Mexican heritage, crafted in collaboration with pioneering Mexican creatives and released across Mexico, the United States, and Canada.
The campaign, published in Mexico in October 2023 following its global debut on September 20, 2023, represents the culmination of the brand's three-year "Por Amor" platform, according to Marketing Dive. Where earlier instalments in that platform established the emotional territory, "A Love Letter to Mexico" is its most ambitious realisation to date — described by MediaPost as Don Julio's largest global campaign at the time of its launch. The film functions as a poem written both to and from Mexico, the country where Don Julio González founded the brand that would eventually become one of the world's most recognised premium tequilas.
In Mexico, where tequila carries the weight of national identity and protected geographic designation, the campaign's strategic stakes extend well beyond brand awareness. The work draws on the relentless passion attributed to the brand's founder and channels it through a distinctly contemporary lens: a creative roster composed entirely of Mexican and Mexican-American artists. Diageo, which has owned Don Julio since 2015 according to Marketing Dive, announced the campaign on September 21, 2023, signalling the scale of investment behind it. With a Clapboard Score of 69 out of 100, the campaign demonstrates meaningful creative ambition and cultural coherence, even as its commercial impact remains subject to ongoing analysis.
Don Julio held the position of global retail-value leader in the tequila category as of 2023, according to The Spirits Business. That standing does not guarantee insulation from competitive pressure. The broader tequila category was expanding rapidly at the time of the campaign's launch, with global volume reaching approximately 42.7 million nine-litre cases in 2023 and growing at roughly 11.4 percent year over year, according to Glass and Note. In this environment, differentiation on heritage and authenticity becomes a meaningful strategic lever, particularly in the Mexican market where those claims are not merely aspirational but verifiable.
Casamigos, backed by a devoted celebrity following, and Patrón, long established as a premium benchmark in the United States, represent the primary competitive pressures Don Julio navigates in the ultra-premium segment. Against these rivals, "A Love Letter to Mexico" does not compete on lifestyle aspiration alone. Instead, Anomaly New York anchored the campaign in the insight that Mexican national pride — particularly among consumers who feel the cultural weight of tequila's origins — constitutes a more durable emotional connection than celebrity endorsement or lifestyle imagery.
North America represented approximately 63.5 percent of global tequila revenue in 2023, according to Accio, which makes the simultaneous rollout across Mexico, the United States, and Canada a commercially coherent decision as well as a culturally resonant one. In Mexico specifically, the campaign addresses an audience that does not need to be persuaded that tequila matters; it needs to be reminded that Don Julio belongs to them. The "Por Amor" platform, which launched in August 2022 per Marketing Dive before reaching its fullest expression in this film, provided the strategic foundation for that argument.
JC Molina directed "A Love Letter to Mexico" as his directorial debut. Molina, a Mexican-American artist, described the commission as both an honour and a privilege, stating, as reported by LBB Online: "As a Mexican American artist I have always felt inspired by my culture. To be asked to film a love letter to mi Mexico, as my directorial debut, has been an honor and a great privilege." That biographical fact is not incidental to the campaign's meaning — it is central to its creative argument. Don Julio did not import an established directorial voice to interpret Mexico from a distance; it handed that responsibility to someone for whom the subject is personal.
The collaborative structure extended across the full creative roster. Leanne Amann served as co-director and creative collaborator, according to LBB Online. Flavia Martinez served as cinematographer, as reported by The Spirits Business, bringing a specific visual sensibility to the film's rapid, celebratory pace — a quality that Muse by Clio noted in its trade coverage of the campaign. Nayeli De Alba worked as stylist and creative director, per LBB Online, while Thalia Gochez served as photographer, as reported by MediaPost. Carlos Eric Lopez contributed as an additional creative collaborator across the production.
Anomaly New York, the agency of record credited across trade sources including LBB Online and Shanken News Daily, structured the campaign as a single sixty-second cinematic film, shot across Mexico, with a production approach that Muse by Clio described as visually rapid in its celebration of Mexico's creative community. In Mexico, where the imagery of agave fields, artisanal production, and cultural festivity carries specific and widely understood meanings, the decision to root every creative frame in authentic Mexican authorship gives the film a credibility that no amount of location photography alone could provide.
No independently verified sales or market-share performance data for "A Love Letter to Mexico" is publicly available at the time of writing. The campaign's documented reach, however, offers a meaningful proxy for engagement. The film accumulated 535,520 views alongside 403 likes and 48 comments across tracked platforms. While these figures reflect a single distribution window and do not capture the full scope of a campaign that ran across Mexico, the United States, and Canada, they indicate a level of audience engagement consistent with premium brand content in the spirits category.
Trade press reception provides a further dimension of evidence. Ad Age covered the campaign as Don Julio's direct response to competitive pressure in the tequila market, framing Anomaly's "love letter to Mexico" positioning as a deliberate strategic choice rather than a stylistic flourish, per Ad Age's reporting. MediaPost characterised it as the brand's largest global campaign to date, a designation that implies a level of media investment beyond previous efforts on the "Por Amor" platform. Muse by Clio offered specific praise for the film's visual pace and its function as a celebration of Mexico's creative community.
Structurally, the campaign's effectiveness rests on a coherent alignment between creative premise and distribution strategy. By commissioning Mexican and Mexican-American artists for every senior creative role, Don Julio ensured that the authenticity claim embedded in its narrative was not merely stated but demonstrated. In a category where heritage positioning is endemic, that demonstration carries weight with an informed audience in Mexico and among the diaspora communities the campaign also addresses across North America.
"A Love Letter to Mexico" is a 2023 cinematic film campaign for Don Julio Tequila, created by Anomaly New York and released across Mexico, the United States, and Canada. It functions as a poetic homage to the brand's Mexican origins, crafted in collaboration with pioneering Mexican and Mexican-American creatives, and represents the culmination of Don Julio's three-year "Por Amor" platform.
JC Molina directed the campaign as his directorial debut. Molina is a Mexican-American artist who described the commission as a personal honour. Leanne Amann served as co-director, Flavia Martinez as cinematographer, and Nayeli De Alba as stylist and creative director, forming an all-Mexican creative team, as reported by LBB Online and The Spirits Business.
Anomaly New York created the campaign. The agency has served as Don Julio's creative partner across the broader "Por Amor" platform, which launched in August 2022. Anomaly structured the 2023 campaign as a single sixty-second cinematic film shot across Mexico, according to trade coverage by MediaPost and LBB Online.
The campaign debuted globally on September 20, 2023. Diageo announced it on September 21, 2023. The campaign was published in Mexico in October 2023 as part of a phased rollout across Mexico, the United States, and Canada, representing Don Julio's largest global campaign at that time, according to MediaPost.
The film is the culmination of Don Julio's three-year "Por Amor" platform, which began in 2022, according to Marketing Dive. The platform uses Mexican cultural pride as its central strategic insight, positioning Don Julio not merely as a premium spirit but as an authentic expression of Mexican heritage and artisanal tradition across its core markets.
The campaign accumulated 535,520 views, 403 likes, and 48 comments across tracked platforms. Ad Age, MediaPost, and Muse by Clio each covered it as a significant moment in tequila advertising. Don Julio held the global retail-value leadership position in the tequila category as of 2023, according to The Spirits Business, providing broader commercial context.
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