The normal order is film, edit, send, adjust. You shoot on Tuesday, the client sees it on Friday, somebody asks for a different opening.
Drinks brands run that sequence backwards. The script is approved before the camera comes out, often line by line, and nothing about that is a comment on your talent.
Why the order flips
The brand carries the risk, and the risk does not sit in the edit.
What can be said and shown about alcohol is governed, it varies by market and by channel, and the consequences land on the brand rather than on the person holding the phone. So the moment worth controlling is the one before anything exists, because a script can be changed in ten minutes and a shoot day cannot be re shot for free.
Read the process that way and it stops feeling like distrust. A brand that sends your script to be checked is doing the only thing that protects both of you.
What this changes in practice
Three things, all of them decided at the quote rather than during the project.
The script is a deliverable
Write it, send it, and get it back approved before you book anything. Treat that document as a stage with its own line, because it takes real time and it is where the work actually gets defined.
Improvisation stops being free
On most shoots, a better line that occurs to you on the day is a bonus. Here it is an unapproved claim, and it will be cut even if it is the best thing in the video.
Shoot the approved version first, completely. If you want to offer an alternative, film it as a clearly separate take and flag it as needing approval rather than slipping it into the delivery.
Revisions come from compliance, not taste
The feedback you get may have nothing to do with whether something works, and arguing about it as if it were a creative note wastes everyone's time. Ask what needs to change, change it, and keep the conversation short.
| Normal client | Drinks brand | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Approves the edit | Approves the script | Fixing a script costs minutes |
| Welcomes improvisation | Cuts anything unapproved | Every line has to be cleared |
| Feedback is taste | Feedback is compliance | It is not a discussion about quality |
| Asks where it will run later | Asks first | The market decides what is allowed |
| One version for everywhere | Sometimes several | Export markets differ |
The fourth row is the one that reorganises a Belgian project, and it is the reason to ask before writing anything.
The export question, which is the Belgian part
Belgian breweries and distillers sell abroad. A video shot in Leuven can end up running in three countries whose rules are not the same, and nobody tells the creator that at briefing because internally it is obvious.
Ask at the first conversation which markets this is for. If the answer is more than one, the script has to survive the strictest of them or be written in versions, and either way that is a scoping decision rather than a detail. It also changes what you shoot: material that works everywhere tends to be about the product, the making and the place, rather than about people drinking.
What you must not decide alone
Whether something is allowed, who the audience is, and how the post is targeted are not creator decisions.
You can and should ask the questions, and you should refuse to answer them yourself. If a brand asks you to judge what is acceptable, the correct answer is that their compliance side signs it off, in writing, before the shoot. That sentence protects your invoice and your reputation at the same time, and no serious drinks client is surprised to hear it.
The same applies to your own channels if you are asked to post. Agreeing to publish something on your account makes you the publisher of it, which is a different position from being the supplier of a file.
Keep reading
- You switched to Dutch to be polite, and that is the wrong document
- The buyer nobody in your niche is emailing
- Nobody Has Decided Not to Pay You
- The One UGC Brief Marketing Does Not Pay For
- The complete UGC guide for Belgium
Frequently asked questions
Does this pay better than other verticals?
Often, and the reason is the process rather than generosity. Longer approval chains and stricter deliverables mean fewer creators bid, so quote for the admin as well as the shoot.
Can I show people drinking?
That is exactly the question to send to the brand rather than to answer yourself. What is acceptable depends on the product, the market and where it runs, and it is their call to make in writing.
What if the brand has no compliance contact?
Then it is a small producer and the caution belongs to you. Keep the script descriptive, put the approval request in writing anyway, and keep the reply.
Should I still film alternative takes?
Yes, and label them. An unapproved alternative sitting clearly marked in the delivery is useful; the same shot mixed into the main cut creates a problem for someone.