Difference between a pre-Prohibition style lager and post-Prohibition?

It absolutely is a challenge, and I'd say that's worthy of bolded emphasis:
Selling lagers to the beer geek segment of the craft beer market is a challenge.

In 2017, it's probably even more difficult to bring a brand of lager (historical or traditional style) to the market without it facing a great deal of scorn and ridicule from those who discovered beer only during this most recent phase of the Craft Beer Era.

On the one hand I'm thankful they put in any effort whatsoever, even if the end result is a less than painstakingly, 100%-authentic to the process Pre-Pro recipe. I know that they're trying to educate (or "educate" -- my inner snob right there) as many casual drinkers as possible (and let's face it: most replying to this particular thread are not their target market in that sense.)

On the other hand I understand how their efforts to educate are laughed-at by 99% of today's serious Craft Beer lifestylers, which makes any such effort on their part incredibly wasteful from the standpoint of their available (time, money, distribution, marketing) resources.

 

But Jon, there is an 'opportunity' here as well since the beer geek segment is such a small portion of the craft beer market.

If breweries are capable of appealing to the broader craft beer market (which by numbers is a larger segment of the market) they potentially have the ability to sell millions of barrels of beer.

Just three examples:

• New Belgium Fat Tire
• Yuengling Lager
• Shiner Bock

If craft breweries like Cold Spring can obtain a portion of that share of the market they can sell a lot of beer!

On BA, there is passionate discussion on beer styles like Barrel Aged beer and Sours. While those beer sell for BIG BUCKS and thereby represent a fair bit of profit, those beer do not represent much sales from a barrels per year perspective. Any brewery that can produce a craft beer (at craft beer prices) that sell in the many, many barrels of beer volume represent some serious revenue.

The 'trick' is marketing a beer to the broader segment of the craft beer market such that you obtain volume of sales. Batch 19 did not 'work' for Coors but maybe this was because Coors is part of the 'evil' BMC brewery consortium? Maybe an independent craft brewery could do 'better' here? Especially if they have effective sales people behind their effort (hint, hint)?

Cheers!