The shift to seeing a bottle of Lagunitas Pils in a John Mayer music video or Woody Allen movie (both of which have recently happened) is as organic a move as the industry’s growth itself.
As craft beer continues to gobble up Big Beer’s market share, small breweries are increasingly grappling with the question of whether to handle communications in-house or farm it out to an outside PR agency.
Breweries who go ahead with designing and selling their own jerseys have had success with a targeted audience. Many craft drinkers are cyclists, runners and outdoor enthusiasts.
As the relationship between breweries, brewers guilds, beer publications and beer bloggers gets cozier, hard lines are becoming more difficult to define.
In the craft beer sphere, story remains a crucial component of building and maintaining a strong brand identity. It’s not just about making solid, drinkable and interesting beers.
True brand loyalty implies an attachment to the brand itself and what it represents. Like Harley-Davidson riders who equate the brand with outlaws and the open road, and Apple owners fanatically devoted to design.
Just like there is no typical craft beer, there seems to be no typical craft logo. And with the ongoing proliferation of craft breweries in the US, branding is becoming both more crucial and more impressive than ever before.
In marketing, connecting a face to the “brand” means something. But for the small guys who can’t afford national publicity and TV commercials, that connection and personal brand management becomes a physical reality with their taprooms.
Andy Thomas spent 12 years at Heineken International, where he held the reins as president and CEO of Heineken USA from 2005–2007. Then he surprised everyone when he accepted the position of president of the Craft Brewers Alliance.
Some great beers unfortunately get tagged with horrid labels—ranging from boring to sophomoric, to sexist—while mediocre beers get wrapped in a packaging tale that’s much more interesting than the beer.
Stone’s Ales not cutting the mustard; Georgetown brewing changes brew’s name, logo; crew kidnapped while attempting to film commercial in Mexico; “Orange Girls” arrested for alleged World Cup guerilla marketing stunt.
The internet and social media have changed the way we connect with those who sell us the beer we love. Now we can actually communicate directly with them and tell them what we do and don’t like about what’s going on with their beer.
Amidst the accolades and successes, we in the industry should constantly be on the lookout for new ways to invite beer drinkers to the craft beer party.
From our point of view, an honest series of compelling craft beer ads during this year’s Super Bowl would have most definitely stood out among the mediocrity and made some form of impact.
After more than a year of rumors, analyst whispers and convenient press leaks, corporate brewing giant InBev finally made its move on America’s largest brewery.
Somewhere along the way, the intersection of cultural amity and the entrepreneurial spirit of big business morphed traditional celebrations into global bashes devoid of historic meaning.
